I was most intrigued by this week’s reading pertaining to the UFCO and Guatemala’s specific relationship with it. I had long known that the exploitation of the banana crop in Latin America had been a means of near-slavery for the workers of these fields, but I hadn’t known the expanse of UFCO’s monopoly – I thought that the “banana problem” had only really existed in Caribbean countries. I found it fascinatingly horrible that the UFCO was able to hold a position of domination in nearly every country it involved itself with. The fact that a corporation was able to control basic social services such as schools and hospitals is appalling, and in terms of the economic spectrum I suppose the UFCO would be total capitalism, though I’m not sure if this is correct, because it would be an example of a private property (or a private company) controlling not only the markets but also some parts of a country’s infrastructure.
Of course, this made Arbenz’s Plan 900 even more impressive as he seemed to, with his presidency, be able to manipulate the giant company UFCO through political means. The law, at least as it is explained in this week’s reading, seemed to be filled with perfect rhetoric and design as Guatemala was able to not only redistribute land to peasants, but also take away so much land for such a little price from UFCO. Even though, in the end, Arbenz ended up being forced to resign from his Guatemalan presidency and flee the country, it was only due to the U.S. bullying its way into Guatemalan affairs. In other words, an extremely powerful and wealthy country will always be able to somehow shove its way and coerce a smaller, militarily weaker country, but the fact that the U.S. was forced to go down to that level in order to get its way says something very positive about Arbenz and his strong law in Guatemala.
