Foreign and Domestic

One of the more intriguing things I have noted about Latin Americans over the years is their ability to maintain separate foreign and domestic policies in relation to their basic political worldviews, even if the two are pulling in rather obviously different directions.

When they move into a more developed country, particularly where they take up a professional position or otherwise well-remunerated career path, they frequently appear keen to adopt all the latest 'progressive' causes and are often extremely vocal in their opposition to the forces that oppose them: textbook liberals in that respect.

But switch the discourse towards the nations of their birth and one often rather quickly detects a shift of emphasis: more libertarian than liberal, a grudging admiration for more authoritarian approaches, a distaste for migration and so on. 

Even when these are absent or suppressed, there is a much more transparent willingness to accept the inherent messiness, those more than occasionally dirty compromises, that underpin most American republics.

Between these two quite distinct responses there has been erected some kind of Chinese Wall, of which I think they are largely not even really aware themselves.