The transformations of the international system during the first decades of the twenty-first century have shaped a scenario of growing geopolitical complexity marked by the transition toward a multipolar world order. The rise of new economic and technological powers, the reconfiguration of strategic alliances, disputes over critical natural resources, and the expansion of new forms of conflict have turned Latin America and the Caribbean into a territory of growing geostrategic interest for the main global actors.
The region today faces challenges associated with disputes over strategic resources such as water, biodiversity, minerals critical to the energy transition, conventional energy sources, and logistical and trade corridors. At the same time, mechanisms of economic pressure, technological dependency, the militarization of security, digital surveillance, and narrative disputes that affect the possibilities of building sovereign development projects are deepening.
In this context, the persistence of forms of direct and indirect intervention by foreign powers, particularly the United States within the framework of its historical hemispheric influence, raises questions about the self-determination of peoples, the sovereignty of states, and the capacity of Latin American and Caribbean countries to autonomously define their development, security and international insertion agendas.
Likewise, the expansion of doctrines associated with hybrid warfare, the securitization of social and economic problems, extraterritorial sanctions, financial blockades, and mechanisms of control over global supply chains are reconfiguring power relations in the region, generating new challenges for democracy, human rights and peacebuilding.
Given this panorama, it is urgent to promote academic spaces that allow for a critical understanding of the contemporary dynamics of global geopolitical dispute from Latin American and Caribbean perspectives. This symposium proposes to analyze the political, economic, social, cultural and environmental impacts of these disputes, as well as alternatives aimed at strengthening regional integration, South-South cooperation, technological sovereignty, the defense of the commons, and the strategic autonomy of peoples.
Likewise, it seeks to contribute to reflection on the conditions necessary to advance toward a regional architecture of peace based on social justice, democracy, the protection of territories, respect for self-determination, and the political resolution of conflicts. In a context of profound global transformations, this space aims to contribute to the construction of critical knowledge committed to the sovereignty, dignity and peace of Latin America and the Caribbean.
