This week’s reading brought in economic aspects to the history of Latin America. “Bananas Are Our Business” seemed like a silly title but after reading it, the title was the perfect description of the situation. The text gave an in-depth description of bananas, the UFCO, and how the two are intermingled with the history of Latin America. In addition, this text offered a view of the manipulating nature of the United States during the time.

Clearly, the United States took advantage of their position as one of the most powerful nations in the world at the time and used it to create economic relationships that seemed beneficial for others but the main goal being exponential benefits for themselves. The US set up a trap that Latin America fell into. Looking at the choices from Latin America’s perspective, however, allows me to understand why the country chose to agree with the US conditions. It seemed that the offer would bring a lot of economic benefits to Latin America as the US created the demand for bananas and Latin America would sell them and receive capital in return. This, however, created an economy that was completely dependent on the demand for bananas in the US.

Although this is an extremely manipulative way of conducting business, I can partly see why the US did it. The US was already an extremely powerful nation and the relationship with Latin America would only bring benefits. It was the US that made the conditions of the economic relationship because Latin America barely in a position to make demands of their own, especially when there were immediate benefits.