Abstract
This LL.M. thesis examines the specific barriers to economic development in Central America during the 1980s, a period marked by political instability, social revolution, and economic crisis. The work analyzes the structural weaknesses of Central American economies — including their dependence on a narrow base of agricultural exports (coffee, cotton, bananas, beef, and sugar), deteriorating terms of trade, and chronic balance-of-payments deficits — and traces the historical patterns of land tenure and concentration that have perpetuated inequality across the region. The thesis also examines the social and economic transformation of Nicaragua following the fall of Somoza in 1979, as well as U.S. import controls and protectionist measures affecting Central American agricultural trade — including tariff barriers, quotas on meat, sugar, and textiles, the Caribbean Basin Initiative, and politically motivated trade sanctions such as the 1985 embargo on Nicaragua. The thesis concludes that U.S. agricultural protectionism and politically motivated trade restrictions have compounded the region's underdevelopment, and that lasting progress requires democratization, land reform, restoration of U.S.–Nicaraguan commercial relations, and a revised U.S. policy framework that conditions economic aid on political pluralism rather than military solutions.
Repository Citation
Ruiz, Evelyn Urtecho, "Specific Barriers to Central American Development" (1989). LLM Theses and Essays. 355.
https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu/stu_llm/355