The Monroe Doctrine has run through the entire course of the development of U.S.–Latin America relations. The time when the Monroe Doctrine was declared (1823) roughly coincided with the independence period of major Latin American countries, nearly half a century after United States’ independence. This shows that the Monroe Doctrine embodied the United States’ policy vision for the order of the Western Hemisphere in its earliest period. Its core content lay in ensuring the security of the American continent through a principle of mutual non-interference between the United States and Europe. Over the more than 200 years since the speech that contained what would come to be known as the Monroe Doctrine, it has undergone multiple reinterpretations. Its substantive meaning has evolved from a collective Western Hemisphere consciousness of “the Americas for the peoples of the Americas” into a U.S. hegemonic logic of “the Americas for the United States.” 

Looking back at history, U.S. policy toward Latin America has exhibited pronounced stage-based differences: prior to the establishment of the United States’ position as a global hegemon, it emphasized Pan-Americanism, which prioritized economic cooperation; from the Spanish–American War through the Second World War, U.S. policy toward Latin America oscillated between political intervention and dollar diplomacy; during the Cold War, the United States strengthened the construction of a Western Hemisphere security alliance system; and from the end of the Cold War to the present, economic cooperation has become the main line of U.S. policy toward Latin America, with initiatives such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the Growth in the Americas initiative, and the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity representing different manifestations of this approach. The stage-based differences in U.S. policy toward Latin America stem from the interaction of multiple factors, among which three are of particular importance: first, changes in the United States’ international status; second, structural adjustments in the international system; and third, shifts in Latin America’s collective sense of strategic autonomy. These three factors are interrelated. They both affect U.S. interests in Latin America and the ordering of its policy objectives, and also determine the specific form taken by the Monroe Doctrine.

(1) The Framework of Objectives of the Monroe Doctrine

The reason the Monroe Doctrine has come to be widely regarded (indeed, even recognized within U.S. society itself) as a synonym for U.S. policy toward Latin America is that the Monroe Doctrine clearly articulated the core assumption underlying U.S. policy toward the region: namely, that the geographical proximity between the United States and Latin America determines a high degree of alignment of interests. This assumption also constitutes the underlying logic of U.S. policy toward Latin America. Although U.S. policy toward Latin America has undergone repeated adjustments, its framework of objectives has displayed a strong degree of continuity. Policy changes have been reflected primarily in relative shifts in the prioritization of objectives, rather than in the selection or abandonment of objectives themselves. Overall, the objective framework of the U.S. Monroe Doctrine in Latin America can be understood as operating at the following four levels.

First, security concerns constitute the primary objective of U.S. policy toward Latin America. “Security” was a key term in the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, reflecting both the United States’ concerns about its own sovereignty’s fragility in the early years of independence, and the urgent need of newly independent Latin American countries to defend their sovereignty. The potential counterattack by former European colonial powers became a common external threat faced by both the United States and Latin America during the early period of their independence. However, although the Monroe Doctrine appeared to be aimed at preserving the collective security of the American continent, its real purpose was to safeguard the security of U.S. sovereignty. Thereafter, across different historical periods—including U.S.–Spanish rivalry, World War I, World War II, and the Cold War—security considerations consistently occupied a priority position in U.S. policy toward Latin America. In concrete terms, this was manifested both in U.S. control over countries with special geostrategic positions and key transit routes, and in its possession of strategic resources in Latin America (such as iron, copper, tin, and oil). All of these measures served the goal of securing military initiative and advantage for the United States in its competition with extraregional great powers. This process was marked not only by U.S. infringements on the sovereignty of Latin American countries and even military invasions, but also by the fact that during the Falklands War, the United States went so far as to side with the United Kingdom. All of this reflects the profound divergence between the United States and Latin America at the level of security interests. What the United States has emphasized is the strong linkage between Latin America and U.S. national security, rather than the collective security of the Western Hemisphere. In addition, viewed from the broader trajectory of U.S.–Latin America relations, security concerns were especially prominent during three periods: the early years of U.S. independence, World War II, and the Cold War. While U.S. security concerns in the early independence period are not difficult to understand, in the latter two periods, they reflected the fact that intensifying great-power rivalry exacerbated U.S. security anxieties in Latin America.

Second, hegemonic control constitutes the core objective of U.S. policy toward Latin America. Under the cover of the Monroe Doctrine, the United States displayed increasingly pronounced expansionist tendencies in the Western Hemisphere. In particular, as the United States established and consolidated its position as a global hegemon, its policy discourse toward Latin America no longer avoided openly expressing hegemonic ambitions with respect to the region. For example, the doctrine of “Manifest Destiny” in the 1840s constituted the predatory logic underpinning U.S. invasions of Mexico and other Latin American countries. In the early twentieth century, the “Roosevelt Corollary” and “dollar diplomacy” became the hypocritical justifications for U.S. intervention in—and even overthrow of—Latin American governments, as well as for monopolizing the region’s economic lifelines. During the Cold War, the “domino theory” in turn provided the rationale for U.S. intervention aimed at dominating affairs across the entire Western Hemisphere. In essence, the United States has consistently regarded Latin America as its own “backyard.” This hegemonic logic—blending U.S.–Latin America geostrategic perceptions, U.S. power advantages, and the “America First” principle—has always constituted a central component of U.S. policy toward Latin America. At the level of practice, U.S. policy toward Latin America has manifested not only in overbearing interference in the region’s political, economic, and diplomatic sovereignty, but also in efforts to disrupt and constrain cooperation between Latin America and extraregional countries.

Third, alliance building is an objective that the United States seeks to advance in its policy toward Latin America. The construction of alliance systems is an important means by which the United States maintains and consolidates its global hegemony, and this has been fully reflected at the level of the Western Hemisphere as well. First, the U.S. “isolationism” embodied in the Monroe Doctrine was premised on the concept of collective defense of the Americas. On this basis, the United States further advanced the initiative of Pan-Americanism, and under the banner of resisting the return of European colonialism, continuously strengthened the penetration of U.S. interests into Latin America. Second, after establishing its position as a global hegemon, the United States accelerated the institutional construction of a Western Hemisphere alliance system through various policy instruments. In 1947, it signed the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance with 18 Latin American countries, and in 1948, established the Organization of American States (OAS). During the Cold War, the United States not only reinforced its military deployments in Latin America, but U.S.–Latin American military alliance relationships were concretely manifested in U.S. overseas military interventions. Third, after the end of the Cold War, with the disappearance of external threats, the United States sought to consolidate U.S.–Latin America alliance relations through a package of economic and trade cooperation arrangements. Policy initiatives such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the Growth in the Americas initiative, and the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity all embodied the policy intent of alliance building. In addition, the United States has also displayed a policy approach of multi-issue alliance building in Latin America. Values, value chains, supply chains, and NATO partnership arrangements have become key issues through which the United States has sought to construct alliance partnerships with certain Latin American countries. Overall, the stability of U.S.–Latin America alliances has shown a sustained downward trend since the end of the Cold War. Factors such as U.S. coercive intervention, Latin American countries’ demands for strategic autonomy, efforts at regional unity and self-strengthening, and the trend toward multipolarity in the international system have all intensified Latin American countries’ tendency to distance themselves from the United States.

(2) The Policy Posture of the Monroe Doctrine After Trump’s Return

Trump’s return has delivered a comprehensive shock to international relations. From the selfish logic of “America First,” to a strategic orientation of negative-sum competition, and further to the bullying behavior embodied in the use of the “tariff cudgel,” U.S. hegemonism has been laid bare in full, fundamentally overturning the existing international rules of economic globalization and global governance. Latin America was the first region to feel the impact of Trump’s coercive diplomacy. From pressuring Panama to hand over sovereignty over the canal to renaming the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America”; from the unilateral repatriation of undocumented migrants from Latin America to indiscriminate tariff strikes; from expanding the list of “Latin American terrorist organizations” to U.S. Secretary of Defense Hegseth’s threat to “retake America’s ‘backyard’ in Latin America”—the words and actions of President Trump himself and senior members of his cabinet all reflect a domineering posture of “I am the only one who matters.”

Of particular note is the fact that Trump is the only U.S. president since the end of the Cold War to openly sing the praises of the Monroe Doctrine. This reflects a significant shift in how U.S. conservatives perceive the framework of objectives of U.S. policy toward Latin America. The view that intra–Latin American cooperation, as well as coordination between Latin America and extraregional countries, has impacted many U.S. interests in the region has become a basic consensus among U.S. conservatives. This makes it easy to understand why the Monroe Doctrine has become the core guiding concept of Trump’s policy toward Latin America, why security interests have assumed greater urgency within the objective framework of U.S. policy toward the region, and why “pan-securitization” may become the principal direction of U.S. policy adjustment toward Latin America in the short to medium term. Under these circumstances, the hegemonic principles of the Monroe Doctrine and the sovereignty principles upheld by Latin American countries will once again become the primary contradiction in U.S.–Latin America relations, and will come into tension with the United States’ two major objectives of pursuing hegemony and building alliances.

With respect to Latin America, the Trump administration’s policy is likely to exhibit three basic tendencies. First, it will forcibly link Latin American regional affairs with U.S. national security, thereby enhancing, at the level of public discourse, the perceived “legitimacy” of the Monroe Doctrine’s coercive diplomacy. On issues such as undocumented migration, drug trafficking, and transnational organized crime, the Trump administration is highly likely to reflect a logic of power in which “Latin American countries must yield to U.S. interests,” and the possibility that the United States may adopt unilateral actions that infringe upon the sovereignty of certain Latin American countries cannot be ruled out. Second, it will strengthen economic coercion against Latin American countries. After Trump’s return, the United States first applied escalating pressure on Panama over the issue of canal concessions, forcing Panama to take the erroneous step of no longer renewing its Belt and Road cooperation agreement with China; second, it adopted an indiscriminate policy of imposing additional tariffs on Latin American countries; and finally, in the process of reviewing the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement and the United States–Central America–Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement, the Trump administration is highly likely to extract economic gains by embedding coercive rules. Third, it will shape a Latin American political landscape aligned with U.S. interests at the ideological level through a strategy of “suppressing the left and supporting the right.” The Trump administration is highly likely to intensify sanctions against left-wing governments in countries such as Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, thereby fostering ideological polarization in Latin American politics and, in turn, constraining the space for regional political consensus and economic cooperation.

Trump’s return will bring significant changes to the environment for China–Latin America cooperation. The Trump administration is highly likely to characterize China–Latin America cooperation through a lens of pan-securitization. On the one hand, it will fabricate, out of thin air, a series of risks that China–Latin America cooperation allegedly poses to Latin American countries, thereby fostering political discourse centered on the so-called “China threat.” From the “China plunder theory” advanced by Rubio to the “China threat” rhetoric amplified by Hegseth; from Deputy Secretary of State Landau’s calls to resist China’s participation in cooperation in critical technology sectors to Treasury Secretary Bessent’s smearing of Chinese investment as aimed at “plundering mineral rights and creating debt,” such diplomatic narratives are intended to fuel anti-China public opinion in Latin American countries and shape their perceptions of China. On the other hand, the Trump administration will forcibly associate China–Latin America cooperation with U.S. homeland security, public security, economic security, and military security, exaggerating the necessity and urgency of constraining China–Latin America cooperation. This, in turn, serves to expand domestic social consensus within the United States, and even to confer perceived “rationality” and “legitimacy” on U.S. coercion of Latin American countries to take sides with the United States.

(3) The Strategic Window of Opportunity for China–Latin America Cooperation Remains Sustainable

Since the beginning of the 21st century, China has achieved “latecomer catch-up” and has become an important participant in Latin America’s economic and social development. Both the scope and efficiency of China–Latin America cooperation have achieved leapfrog-style advances. From a short- to medium-term perspective, however, there are many uncertainties in Latin America’s political, economic, and diplomatic environment, as well as U.S. policy toward the region. This stands in sharp contrast to the environment that enabled highly efficient China–Latin America cooperation in the preceding period. There is no doubt that China–Latin America cooperation will face more challenges. Nevertheless, amid growing uncertainty in the global political and economic landscape and the intensification of U.S. hegemonism and protectionism, China’s role has become more indispensable for Latin America. Moreover, as achieving economic growth remains the priority agenda for Latin American countries, China–Latin America relations still possess the fundamental logic needed to sustain a strategic window of opportunity.

First, Latin American countries’ capacity for autonomy continues to grow. For most of the history of U.S.–Latin America relations, resisting U.S. neocolonialism and hegemonism has consistently been a core concern of Latin American countries. In this process, Latin American countries have not only actively explored innovative paths toward regional integration but have also worked to pursue diversified diplomatic agendas. The independent and autonomous diplomacy pursued by Latin American countries during the Cold War, as well as the establishment in the early 21st century of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC)—excluding the United States—are typical manifestations of these two policy approaches. Strengthening cooperation with China not only accords with new trends in international cooperation, but also represents a choice made by Latin American countries in pursuit of diplomatic autonomy, and even more, an effective pathway for offsetting U.S. hegemony. Trump’s return to hegemonic policies and the steadily growing autonomy of Latin American countries thus constitute a structural contradiction. The essence of the “New Monroe Doctrine” not only runs counter to the broader trend of historical development but also contravenes the trajectory of U.S.–Latin America relations. In an era of major-power competition, honoring commitments is the most basic moral obligation of major powers. Trump’s words and actions reveal an “imperialist arrogance,” trampling upon the autonomy that Latin American countries have long strived to secure since achieving independence. The development of China–Latin America relations has consistently adhered to the principles of equality and mutual benefit, mutual respect, openness and inclusiveness, and win–win cooperation. The correct “view of righteousness and interests” upheld by Chinese diplomacy is more aligned with Latin American countries’ moral pursuit of equality and autonomy, and China’s open and inclusive posture is also more closely attuned to Latin American countries’ policy expectations.

Second, China–Latin America economic and trade cooperation possesses strong endogenous momentum and resilience. U.S. strategic anxiety over China–Latin America cooperation stems primarily from the high efficiency of China–Latin America economic and trade cooperation. The efficiency of China–Latin America economic and trade cooperation is grounded in the high degree of economic complementarity between the two sides. This complementarity is reflected not only in trade structures, but also in supply–demand relations at the investment level. It is further based on the shared aspirations of China and Latin American countries with respect to economic globalization, industrial structure transformation and upgrading, and improvements in modernization levels, rather than on economic policy arrangements aimed at “de-Americanization.” In other words, the efficiency and effectiveness of China–Latin America cooperation are rooted in strong endogenous momentum and resilience and are consistent with the general principles of international economic cooperation, rather than constituting bloc-based cooperation directed against the United States. The declaration of the Third Ministerial Meeting of the China–CELAC Forum in 2021 explicitly emphasized the goal of “continuously deepening a new-era China–Latin America relationship characterized by equality, mutual benefit, innovation, openness, and benefits for the people.” This not only reflects the shared characterization of cooperation by both sides, but also fully demonstrates the internal logic underpinning the high efficiency of China–Latin America cooperation. Since China–Latin America cooperation is not built on a foundation of “de-Americanization,” Trump’s coercion of Latin American countries to pursue “de-Sinicization” is naturally unlikely to achieve its intended results, as it distorts the fundamental logic of China–Latin America economic and trade cooperation. Moreover, as Latin America is currently in a period marked by low economic growth and increasing difficulties in national governance, the openness and efficiency of China–Latin America cooperation are more closely aligned with the region’s practical needs.

Third, China and Latin America share common identities and interest-based demands. China and Latin America have undergone similar historical experiences and possess deep historical memories of colonialism, imperialism, and hegemonism. Independence and autonomy have consistently been core principles guiding the foreign policies of both. China and Latin American countries are all developing countries and members of the “Global South.” They face similar development challenges, share aspirations to raise their levels of modernization, and possess policy objectives aimed at advancing reform of the global governance system and establishing a just and reasonable international order. These shared identities and interest-based demands constitute an important foundation for mutual political trust between China and Latin America, and further reflect the depth and breadth of China–Latin America cooperation. From the perspective of Latin American countries’ diplomatic traditions, their core positions on global governance issues are reflected in such areas as identification with developing-country status, the upholding of multilateralism, the establishment of a just and reasonable new international order, and the enhancement of representation for developing countries. This determines that China and Latin America share many “common denominators” at the level of global governance, and possess a strong positive correlation of interests. Following Trump’s return, the multilateral order is faced with severe challenges. Under these circumstances, China and Latin America share a common need to work together to respond to U.S. unilateralism, jointly safeguard multilateralism, and deepen cooperation in global governance.

Accordingly, the two sides’ shared pursuit of an open and inclusive cooperative environment, China’s stimulative effect on Latin American economies, the diversity of China’s policy instruments toward Latin America, and the accessibility of the “dividends” for Latin America from cooperation with China all provide a solid foundation for the steady development of China–Latin America relations in the next stage. In particular, when viewed from such perspectives as the demands of Latin American countries for policy autonomy, the resilience of China–Latin America economic and trade cooperation, and the shared identities and interest-based demands of China and Latin America, it is feasible for China–Latin America cooperation to further sustain its strategic window of opportunity.