Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
Arbenz Administration
Dear Delegates,
Hi! My name is Kara Newman, and I’m so excited to be directing the Árbenz
Administration. I’m a senior at William & Mary and first-year graduate
student working towards a Master’s in Public Policy (although I’m definitely
more emotionally invested in my Latin American Studies minor). I am
currently the Director of Communications for the International Relations
Club and have previously been on the secretariat of WMIDMUN (our middle
school conference) and IRCares, our service committee. Other than my
involvement in IRC, I founded and help run a recycling program for Solo
cups through the Student Environmental Action Coalition (SEAC). I love
bananas, Spanish & Portuguese, and naps, and I’m passionate about issues
related to sustainability and hunger.
Although I didn’t participate in Model United Nations before college, I’ve
been staffing and attending conferences since I joined IRC at the beginning
of freshman year. These experiences have been so valuable for me—Model
UN provides a useful skillset, including public speaking, creativity, problemsolving, working with a diverse group of people, and uniting disparate
viewpoints. I hope that you all find your weekend in 1950s Guatemala as
worthwhile and enjoyable as my experiences with MUN have been.
I’m very excited about all three of the topics discussed below. The
consequences of the 1954 Guatemalan Coup are far-reaching, and it is
fascinating to consider how a few decisions made by a few individuals
may have altered history. In order to prepare for the conference weekend,
you’ll need to write a position paper addressing each of the three topics
(you can find more information about how to write a position paper below).
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
This should help you to develop some of your ideas and make you feel more
prepared for the weekend in general.
I hope you’ll take advantage of your time preparing for and participating in
WMHSMUN and in the Árbenz Administration to gain an understanding of
these topics, to improve your communication and critical thinking skills, to
meet other smart, engaged, and creative delegates, and to have a blast—the
harder you work, both in your preparation for committee and throughout
the weekend, the more fun you’ll have. That being said, there’s no reason to
stress; if you find yourself lost or confused as you prepare for the conference
or during the weekend itself, please feel free to reach out to me—I’m here to
help!
WMHSMUN requires that every delegate submits a position paper. This
paper must address the topics presented by the committee through the lens
of your position. For more information on what is expected from position
papers, there is a link on the WMHSMUN website, under the “committees”
tab. We highly suggest that you use this tool in order to make your position
paper as effective as possible! For Specialized Agencies, we highly
encourage you to email your position paper to your chair before the first
committee session. If this cannot be done for any reason, you may submit a
hard copy to your dais at the beginning of the first committee session.
Lastly, I hope you’re as excited as I am for WMHSMUN! If you have
any questions about the Guatemalan cabinet, events discussed in the
background guide, MUN, William & Mary, or college in general, please don’t
hesitate to email me at [email protected]! I would absolutely love to
hear from you, and I can’t wait to see you all in November!
Kara Newman
Director, Arbenz Administration
[email protected]
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
Arbenz Administration
Dear Delegates,
Hello, my name is Hannah Major and I am a sophomore at the
College of William & Mary, with a Business and Hispanic Studies
double major. I am deeply involved with our International Relations
Club here, and I am beyond excited to be crisis directing the Arbenz
Administration! I love all things related to the Hispanic world, food,
movie nights, and current events.
I was somewhat involved in Model United Nations throughout
high school, but did not truly love it until I came to William & Mary.
Through Model UN, I have made my best friends and have had the
best experiences while traveling as a delegate! I hope you enjoy this
weekend and make some amazing memories here on campus. If
you have any questions at all about WMHSMUN, Model UN, William
& Mary, or this committee specifically, please feel free to reach out
to Kara or I at any point, either now or during the conference!
See you in November!
Hannah Major
Crisis Director, Arbenz Administration
[email protected]
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
Committee
Procedure
This committee is Jacobo Árbenz’s cabinet. Set in 1951, the
Árbenz Administration will have a chance to change the
course of history starting from the beginning of his presidency.
Delegates should work together to advise the president on
policies, statements, and executive actions.
This committee is a crisis committee that will be run using
parliamentary procedure, or “ParliPro” for short. This means
that the session will start with roll call: when your position is called, you will raise your
placard and answer “present.” A delegate will then motion to open debate. As with all
motions, the delegates will vote either in favor of the motion or opposed to the motion.
A simple majority is required for a motion to pass.
At any point, a delegate can motion for either a moderated caucus or an unmoderated
caucus. In a moderated caucus, when the delegate makes the motion, he or she will
specify the total time for the caucus, the speaking time for each speaker, and the
subject of the caucus. In an unmoderated caucus, the delegate must suggest a time
limit and subject. During an unmoderated caucus (or “unmod” for short,) all delegates
move around and speak to each other casually, instead of addressing the entire room.
Delegates can accomplish things both in the room and out of the room. In the room,
delegates may pass directives as a body. These will be written collaboratively and
must pass with a majority vote to take effect. They may also send personal (individual)
and joint directives to crisis. Based on both directives and crisis notes, there will
be updates about new events, situations, problems, etc. that the body will have to
address.
Throughout the duration of each session, please be polite and respect your peers
by remaining silent while they are debating, not using electronic devices (such as
cell phones) in committee, and keeping your notes professional and appropriate.
While you may pass notes, these notes must be relevant to the committee. These
notes may be screened, and anything offensive or inappropriate will not be passed. In
extreme cases, inappropriate notes will result in school sponsor notification or removal
from committee. If someone on the dais calls “Decorum,” this is a reminder of these
expectations.
If you have any questions about ParliPro, of if you want a more detailed
description, please consult the Guide to MUN. If you still can’t find the answer to your
question, feel free to send me an email.
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
J
orge Ubico,
known as
Introduction “Central America’s
& Background Napolean,” was
Information the authoritarian
president of
Guatemala from
1931 to 1944. He fostered a close
relationship with the United States, in
particular, the infamous United Fruit
banana company. Ubico is credited
with improving infrastructure as well
as making advancements in health and
fighting corruption. More importantly
from an international perspective, he
stabilized the economy by stimulating
production of exports and making
trade deals with the United States. This
development often came at the price of
civil liberties. Ubico centralized power,
amended the constitution to extend his
presidency, controlled opposition through
press censorship, and maintained order
through the police. He was fiercely anticommunist, and discredited any politician
farther left by accusing them of being
communists1. Debt Peonage, or debt
slavery, is the practice of coercing labor
to pay off a debt. Under this system,
debtors found themselves unable to
leave their place of work, as they incurred
more charges than their labor covered2.
1 New World Encyclopedia, Jorge Ubico,
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/
entry/Jorge_Ubico
2 Encyclopedia of Latin American
History, Debt Peonage, http://
While Ubico ended debt peonage, he
replaced it with vagrancy laws requiring
that all Mayan men that did not own
land had to find a landowner for whom
they could work for at least 100 days
out of the year and contribute labor
(without pay) on a public works project
for two weeks each year. Decree 1816
made it legal for landowners to kill any
indigenous person who did not abide by
these new laws3.
After he suspended free speech in
1944, a widespread strike forced Ubico’s
resignation. After his successor was
ousted by a military coup (led in part by
Jacobo Árbenz,) elections were held.
What followed is hailed as Guatemala’s
“Ten Years of Spring.” Considered the
first democratically elected president
of the country, Juan José Arévalo
came to power in 1945. Despite 25
separate coup attempts, (mostly from
conservative military officers,) Arévalo
completed his full term in office. His
regime was characterized by what he
called spiritual socialism (sometimes
referred to as Arévalismo). This political
philosophy emphasized the importance
of civil freedoms within the limits of
www.encyclopedia.com/article1G2-3078901858/debt-peonage.html
3 Piero Gleijeses, Shattered Hope: The
Guatemalan Revolution and the United
States, 1944-1954 (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1991), pp. 8-29.
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
the will of the majority4. Though he
instituted many social reforms while in
office, Arévalo rejected communism in
favor of capitalism: he did not legalize
the communist party in Guatemala and
exiled communist activists. At the end
of his historic presidency, he peacefully
transitioned power to his democratically
elected successor.
Jacobo Árbenz was elected in 1951. His
most notable achievement while in office
was agrarian reform. He redistributed
land, the vast majority of which was
owned by the United Fruit Company.
In 1954, the United States Central
Intelligence Agency trained rebels
in Honduras and invaded the capital.
Announcing themselves on the radio as
liberators, they bombed Guatemala City
and put Carlos Castillo Armas, a dictator,
in power. Once Árbenz realized that the
Guatemalan army would not fight the U.S.
military, he resigned without a fight and
was quickly exiled.
This committee is set a few years before
the coup, in 1951, soon after Árbenz
began his term as president. Will the
committee be able to implement the
highly popular land reform without
incurring the wrath of the powerful
United Fruit Company and the United
4 Liquisearch, Spiritual Socialism
(Arévalismo), http://www.liquisearch.com/
juan_jos%C3%A9_ar%C3%A9valo/spiritual_
socialism_ar%C3%A9valismo
States government?
T
o understand
land reform
in Guatemala, it’s
Topic I:
important to look
Land Reform
first to Mexico. In
the early 1900s,
Porfirio Díaz
was the president of Mexico. He was
viewed favorably in the United States,
as he protected U.S. business interests.
However, foreigners controlled almost
all of the country’s resources and his
unpopular policies led to the Mexican
Revolution. When Francisco Madero
lost the 1910 election to Díaz, he alleged
electoral fraud and declared himself
provisional president under the Plan de
San Luís Potosí. Although it presented
no framework to achieve it, the plan
announced that land that had been
robbed arbitrarily in the past would be
returned to its original owners or their
heirs. Later, in 1934, Lázaro Cárdenas
became the president of Mexico. Though
Cárdenas is best known for nationalizing
the oil industry, he also instituted
sweeping land reform. He created
collectives of farmers and expropriated
American-owned land. As a result of
these reforms, agricultural productivity
greatly increased at this time5.
Inspired in large part by the success
5 Wikipedia, Land Reform in Mexico,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_reform_in_Mexico
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
Association of Southeast Asian Nations // WMHSMUN 30
of land reform in Mexico, Árbenz
Árbenz’s dramatic law had other
implemented wide-scale redistribution
important effects: it abolished slavery and
of unused lands in Guatemala. Both
unpaid labor and ended debt peonage by
Mexico and Guatemala suffered under
banning work as rent. It also specifically
the pernicious influence of U.S. business
abolished the relocation and reallocation
interests, and both leaders implemented
of labor that had been a part of Ubico’s
ambitious redistribution policies. Although vagrancy laws. It also included literacy
Jacobo Árbenz was by no means a
programs, which were not implemented
populist, both politicians appealed to
until 19548.
nationalism and a growing middle class
The president’s intention was to end the
to achieve their victories6.
de facto feudal system that had kept
Decree 900 was signed into law on
many of the country’s poorest inhabitants
June 17th, 1952. It established the
plagued by debt. He made significant
National Agrarian Department (DAN),
progress towards that goal: one-sixth of
which oversaw the redistributing of any
Guatemalans received land under the
uncultivated land, as well as government- new system and agricultural technology
owned fincas nacionales (national farms).
improved. Despite the flight of foreign
The DAN’s power was decentralized and
investment, high coffee prices kept the
requests for land were filed through local
economy prosperous9.
agrarian committees. More than 200,000
Árbenz instituted other reforms that
acres of land were expropriated from the
undermined United Fruit’s power and
United Fruit Company; Panama Disease
influence in Guatemala. Notably, he
(discussed in more detail below) had
worked on constructing the Atlantic
forced the business to leave much of its
Highway, which undercut United Fruit’s
land uncultivated, making it vulnerable
dominance in the transportation industry.
for seizure under the new law. More
Prior to the highway’s construction, the
than 500,000 families received land, and
banana company’s trains were almost
coffee, corn, rice, and wheat production
all increased in the years following the
States, 1944-1954 (Princeton: Princeton
7
University Press, 1991), pp. 149-169.
land reform .
6 Solon L. Barraclough, The North American Congress on Latin America, The
Legacy of Latin American Land Reform,
https://nacla.org/article/legacy-latin-american-land-reform
7 Piero Gleijeses, Shattered Hope: The
Guatemalan Revolution and the United
8 Douglas W. Trefzger, “Guatemala’s
1952 Agrarian Reform Law: A Critical Reassessment,” International Social Science
Review (2002): http://www.ditext.com/
trefzger/agrarian.html
9 Wikipedia, Decree 900, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decree_900
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
the only way Guatemalans could move
from place to place. Árbenz established
the Santo Tomás de Castilla Harbor,
providing an alternative to United Fruit’s
Puerto Barrios. Although his plans
were not completed for years after
his presidency, he began construction
on a hydroelectric plant in an attempt
to disrupt the American monopoly on
energy in Guatemala10.
Árbenz’s policies were dramatic, but
effective. However, they upset other
key players in Guatemala at the time,
ultimately leading to the 1954 coup. This
committee will have a chance to decide
if it is possible to fulfill the promises
of Árbenz’s campaign while keeping
powerful foreign interests pacified.
Questions to
Consider:
1. Were Árbenz’s
reforms successful
in accomplishing
his goals of
transitioning to a
capitalist system?
2. What alternatives might Árbenz have
pursued to reach those goals?
3. How did these reforms affect the
United States? What consequences
could that have for Guatemala?
10 Wikipedia, Jacobo Árbenz, https://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobo_%C3%81rbenz
G
ros Michel
bananas,
Topic II:
the variety most
The United Fruit
commonly sold in
Company
most of the world
prior to 1950, do
not reproduce
by themselves; they must be carefully
cultivated in precise conditions to grow.
(Williams Cavendish, the variety we
know today that replaced Gros Michel
completely by 1960, faces the same
problem.) Although bananas are the most
popular type of fruit in the United States
and Europe, they grow exclusively in
tropical regions. Guatemala has the right
terrain and climate to support this fragile
fruit.
The beginning of large-scale banana
production coincided with the invention
of refrigerated ships. Known as “banana
boats,” they were used to transport the
quick-to-ripen fruit beginning in the
1870s. In the early 20th century, the
United Fruit Company (formed from
the merger of the Tropical Trading and
Transport Company with the Boston Fruit
Company) dominated the industry.
The company’s tactics were brutal
throughout Latin America and the
Caribbean. Based on his experiences
in Honduras, O. Henry coined the term
“banana republic” to refer to the type of
government that bowed to the interests
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
of the United States and United Fruit.11
The company’s treatment of its workers
left much to be desired. Employees of
the company were generally paid in
coupons to the company’s commissaries,
where prices were majorly inflated.
Managers evaded prosecution by
classifying all of their workers as
temporary, and therefore not legally
competent. The company ruthlessly shut
down unions and protests, often with
violence. Famously, workers on strike in
the small Colombian town of Cienaga
were slaughtered as they peacefully
protested their low pay and harsh
working conditions. As many as 2,000
were killed in the banana massacre12.
The influence of United Fruit and the
banana industry was so pronounced in
Latin America that it has been featured
prominently in famous works from
around the region. Pablo Neruda of Chile
wrote a poem in 1950 entitled “La United
Fruit Co.” It describes how the company
instituted dictatorships (mentioning
Ubico), extracting products at the
expense of the Latin American people13.
11 (William Sydney Porter), O.Henry.
Cabbages and Kings. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN
146639756X.
12 Gene Bell-Villada, “Banana Strike and
Military Massacre: One Hundred Years of
Solitude and What Happened in 1928,” Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years
of Solitude: A Casebook (2002): 127-137.
13 Pablo Neruda, “La United Fruit
Co.”, The Essential Neruda, trans. Jack
Nicaragua’s Ernesto Cardenal mentions
the company’s revolutions, exemptions,
contractual and constitutional violations,
and more in his 1960 poem “Hora Cero”
(Zero Hour). 14 Cien años de soledad
(One Hundred Years of Solitude) by
Gabriel García Márquez describes
the devastating impact of the banana
industry on a small, fictional town in
northern Colombia. Although Macondo,
the setting of the novel, is not real,
the events described are (slightly
exaggerated) accounts of true events15.
Early twentieth century Guatemala was
a textbook case of a “banana republic.”
United Fruit first arrived in the country in
the early 1900s, while Manuel Estrada
Cabrera was president. They built a town
(appropriately named “Bananera”) and
established plantations. In exchange
for building Guatemala’s infrastructure
(including telegraph lines, railroads, and
seaports), Estrada cut favorable deals
for the company. The development
that occurred at this time only increased
racial tensions and inequality. Mayans
were increasingly marginalized while
the “Ladino” class (those with Spanish
Hirschman (San Francisco: City Lights,
2004): http://www.redpoppy.net/poem26.
php
14 Ernesto Cardenal, “Hora Cero,” http://
genius.com/Ernesto-cardenal-hora-0-annotated
15 Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred
Years of Solitude, trans. Gregory Rabassa
(New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2006)
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
heritage) benefitted financially. Estrada
was overthrown in 1920, after years of
suppression of the press and execution
of his enemies.16
Jorge Ubico was elected in 1931, and
carried on Estrada’s authoritarian legacy.
Panama Disease, a fungal affliction
affecting bananas that spreads quickly
through soil, was beginning to spread
through the country. United Fruit needed
more and more land to make up for
losses from the pernicious disease,
but undervalued it so much that it was
exempt from paying any taxes for it.
Ubico’s fierce anti-communism made
life harder for laborers working for
United Fruit. He banned the words “trade
union,” “strike,” “petition,” and “worker,”
as well as detaining and killing those he
perceived as having connections with
labor movements. Even Arévalo’s social
reforms largely did not apply to banana
workers.17
Árbenz’s 1952 land reform applied only to
unused land. Because Panama Disease
affected so much of the company’s
land, acres and acres were not being
used in banana production. Since United
Fruit hoped to find a way to make the
land productive for banana production
16 Dan Koeppel, Banana: The Fate of the
Fruit That Changed the World. (New York:
Penguin Group, 2008).
17 Dan Koeppel, Banana: The Fate of the
Fruit That Changed the World. (New York:
Penguin Group, 2008).
once more, they chafed at having to
turn it over to the government. They
were compensated at the value of
the land claimed on their tax returns,
which was much lower than its actual
value. Árbenz’s administration further
angered the powerful company by
building ports (to compete with the Rio
Dulce port, controlled by the company)
and the establishment of a highway
system, (which undermined United
Fruit’s railroad-based dominance of
Guatemala’s transportation).18
The United Fruit Company had close
ties with the United States Government.
John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State
from 1953 to 1959, was formerly a partner
at the company’s law firm. His brother,
Allen Dulles, was the Director of the
Central Intelligence Agency from 1953
to 1961 and was a former member of
United Fruit’s board. The company had
a powerful influence over media in the
United States as well.19
18 Dan Koeppel, Banana: The Fate of the
Fruit That Changed the World. (New York:
Penguin Group, 2008).
19 Brendan Fischer, “A Banana Republic Once Again?” The Center for Media
and Democracy’s PRWatch: http://www.
prwatch.org/news/2010/12/9834/banana-republic-once-again
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
1. What made
Guatemala
vulnerable to
Questions to becoming a
Consider:
“banana republic?”
Why were leaders
such as Estrada
and Ubico willing to work with United
Fruit?
2. How was the United Fruit Company
able to exert so much power in the
region?
3. How could a leader mitigate that
immense power without provoking the
response that followed in 1954?
4. What opportunities could there have
been for cooperation with the United
Fruit Company while still protecting the
rights of Guatemalans?
T
he United
Topic III:
States has
United States a long history of
interventionism.
Foreign Policy in
The Monroe
the 1950s
Doctrine, described
by James Monroe
in 1823, designated all of the Americas
as within the United States’ sphere of
influence. It stated that any interference
in the governments of the New World
by European powers would be viewed
as acts of aggression requiring U.S.
intervention, but also made it clear that it
would not interfere in existing European
colonies or the domestic affairs of
Old World powers. In 1904, Theodore
Roosevelt established his corollary to the
Monroe Doctrine, which explicitly stated
that the use of military force could be
used to enforce the doctrine. Although
there was a brief departure from this
attitude in the 1930s under Franklin
Delano Roosevelt’s “Good Neighbor
Policy,” the change did not last long. John
Foster Dulles, U.S. Secretary of State,
used the Monroe Doctrine as justification
for the 1954 Coup: he argued that the
Soviet Union was illegally intervening in
Guatemala to spread communism.
After the conclusion of World War II,
the uneasy alliance that had bound
the United States to the Soviet Union
dissolved and a new era had begun.
The Cold War, a period of tension
between these two powers, lasted from
approximately 1947 to 1991. Although
the two did not engage directly in armed
conflict, each side supported different
sides in various proxy wars. The nature of
the Cold War varied throughout the nearly
half-century of conflict. This committee is
set in the beginning stages, immediately
following World War II.
“The Second Red Scare” is used to
describe the period from 1947 to
1957, when McCarthyism gripped the
United States. The term is derived from
Senator Joseph McCarthy, who rose to
prominence through his (largely baseless)
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
accusations of communist infiltration
of the government (including President
Truman’s advisors, the State Department,
and the Army.) The House Un-American
Activities Committee conducted
investigations on suspected communists.
They were particularly concerned with
the suspected Soviet infiltration of the
film industry, and created the “Hollywood
Blacklist.” Studios boycotted those
named on the list.
Of course, this widespread fear
of communism extended beyond
the borders of the United States.
President Truman leveraged anticommunist sentiment in creating the
Truman Doctrine. In a 1947 speech,
he announced “It must be the policy
of the United States to support free
peoples who are resisting attempted
subjugation by armed minorities or by
outside pressures”.20 This doctrine was
used to justify the European Recovery
Plan, (better known as the Marshall Plan,)
which gave approximately $130 billion of
aid in today’s terms to Western Europe.
During this time, the United States
adopted a policy of containment. First
described in 1946 by George Kennan,
a prominent American diplomat,
containment is the strategy of preventing
20 Harry Truman, The Truman Doctrine.
Speech presented to a joint session of the
United States Congress, Washington, D.C.
(1947).
the spread of communism abroad.
This policy can be observed both in
humanitarian strategies like the Marshall
Plan and in conflicts like the Korean War,
a proxy war. The North Korean invasion of
South Korean was backed by the Soviet
Union, while the United States (as well
as the United Nations Security Council)
supported South Korean forces.
Arévalo attracted the attention of the
United States when he described his
policies as “spiritual socialism.” However,
he stopped short of implementing
actual land reform and denounced
communism as “contrary to human
nature,”21 so the State Department did
not feel threatened by Arévalo at the
beginning of his presidency; however,
his implementation of the Labor Code
in 1947 changed their perception by
establishing the right to organize unions,
collective bargaining, strikes, and a
minimum wage. Perhaps ironically,
these reforms were based on the United
States’ own Wagner Act of 1935. Árbenz
concerned the United States more. His
drastic land redistribution, legalization of
the Guatemalan Labor Party, and other
left-leaning social reforms were enough
21 Patricia M. Plantamura. “Impacts of
U.S. Foreign Policy and Intervention on
Guatemala: Mid-20th Century.” University
of South Florida Scholar Commons. (2013):
p. 51 http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/
cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5942&context=etd
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
for the McCarthyist government officials
to declare him a communist and justify
the 1954 coup.1
While the Chicago School of Economics
and general economic liberalization were
gaining popularity in the United States,
the same models were rejected farther
south. Raúl Prébisch of the Economic
Commission for Latin America described
how the theory of comparative advantage
left the region in the “periphery of
the world economic system.”2 Called
dependency theory, Prébisch advocated
for industrialization and economic
development in Latin America, not tied to
commodity exports.3
Árbenz made his attitude towards
Guatemalan dependence on what
Prébisch referred to as the economic
centre of the world clear in his inaugural
address in 1951. “Foreign capital will
always be welcome as long as it
1 Patricia M. Plantamura. “Impacts of U.S.
Foreign Policy and Intervention on Guatemala: Mid-20th Century.” University of
South Florida Scholar Commons. (2013):
http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/cgi/
viewcontent.cgi?article=5942&context=etd
2 Raúl Prebisch. “The Economic Development of Latin America and its principal
problems,” Economic Commission for Latin America: http://archivo.cepal.org/pdfs/
cdPrebisch/002.pdf
3 Raúl Prebisch. “The Economic Development of Latin America and its principal
problems,” Economic Commission for Latin America: http://archivo.cepal.org/pdfs/
cdPrebisch/002.pdf
adjusts to local conditions, remains
always subordinate to Guatemalan
laws, cooperates with the economic
development of the country, and strictly
abstains from intervening in the nation’s
social and political life.”4
The United Nations’ Universal Declaration
of Human Rights had an unexpected
effect on U.S. Foreign Policy: it led to the
rise of covert operations by the Central
Intelligence Agency. The document
affirms the importance of respecting
the sovereignty of other states, and the
United States’ signature on the document
prevented it from continuing its former
pattern of openly interventionist policies5.
Covert operations were, in some ways,
more dangerous, as they were not
subject to the same potential backlash
in public opinion. The CIA-backed coup
was therefore planned secretly, given a
codename (PBSUCCESS,) and given a
Guatemalan figurehead (Carlos Castillo
Armas).6
4 Stephen Schlesinger and Stephen
Kinzer, Bitter Fruit: The Story of the American Coup in Guatemala. (Cambridge: Harvard University David Rockefeller Center,
1999).
5 United Nations, Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, http://www.un.org/en/
universal-declaration-human-rights/
6 Ed. Kate Doyle and Peter Kornbluh, CIA
and Assassinations: The Guatemala 1954
Documents, http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/
NSAEBB/NSAEBB4/
Arbenz Administration // WMHSMUN 30
Questions to
Consider:
1. How does U.S.
Foreign Policy
explain the
country’s actions
in Guatemala in
1954?
2. Were the policies of Arévalo and
Árbenz compatible with a capitalist
system? To what extent did communism
influence their regimes?
3. How do these policies limit the ability
of the Guatemalan government to
respond to crises?