Forget Latin America: it's barely on Washington's radar. (Of Several Minds).

If Latin America is not entirely going to hell these days, it seems to be suffering a prolonged stay in purgatory. Political chaos in Venezuela, financial debacle in Argentina, civil war in Colombia, and corruption seemingly everywhere are but the best-known of the region's many challenges. In the face of such tumultuous conditions in a neighboring region, many ask, Where is the United States? Writing in the New York Times last December 17, Nicholas D. Kristof decried U.S. neglect of Latin America. "If only Saddam Hussein ruled Brazil!" he lamented. "If only Hugo Chavez were developing nuclear weapons! Then Washington might pay attention to the fire next door ..."

True, Latin America is not a priority for U.S. foreign policy, nor will it become one anytime soon. Iraq, North Korea, Al Qaeda, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Russia, China, relations with Europe, the Japanese economy ... any of these issues trumps Latin American policy on the U.S. government's to-do list. Just recall how rapidly the Bush administration shelved the "new era" of relations with Mexico following the September 11 attacks. After strutting through Washington in early September 2001, Mexican President Vicente Fox had to return home, cowboy boots and all, and explain why his friends up north were ignoring Mexico, yet again.

Such neglect is hardly new, nor is it a product of George W. Bush's obsession with hunting evildoers elsewhere in the world. For most of the postwar period, Latin America was but a pawn in the East-West geopolitical chess game. The most infamous cases of U.S. involvement in the region--such as the Chilean coup of 1973, or the contra war in the 1980s--were all inspired by the cold war. Even President John F. Kennedy's 1961 Alliance for Progress was simply an attempt to ward off revolutionary politics in the region.

After the cold war, U.S. policy toward the region moved from geopolitics to geo-economics; the promotion of free trade (or the hazier "free-market democracy") became the overarching policy. Passage of the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (nafta) embodied this approach during the 1990s; indeed, the interests nafta created compelled the Clinton administration to support the IMF's multibillion-dollar bailout of the Mexican economy in 1995. Nevertheless, the pattern of neglect persisted; Bill Clinton was the first U.S. president who failed to visit Latin America during his first term in office since Herbert Hoover.

The current U.S.-Latin American relationship is a curious one. A good rapport with Washington makes great sense for the region, but too much closeness backfires in anti-U.S. domestic public opinion. Therefore, Latin politicos crave photo-ops with U.S. officials on the one hand but blast gringo-imposed "neoliberal economics" on the other--without so much as the grace to blush. Similarly, President George W. Bush has looked to Latin America mainly when it is absolutely necessary or politically helpful, such as during his 2000 presidential campaign when, ironically, he used his relationship with Fox to establish his foreign-policy bona fides.

For the moment, "free trade" remains the Bush administration's knee-jerk response to most matters Latin American, with nafta as a model and the creation of a regionwide Free Trade Area of the Americas (ftaa) by 2005 as the stated next goal. It isn't a bad objective: increased access to U.S. markets will help Latin American economies grow. But the impact of an ftaa on Brazil or Argentina will never be as important as nafta has been for Mexico, mainly from South America's sheer geographic distance. Also, while agriculture is a key concern for Latin Americans, U.S. trade negotiators are unlikely to reduce agricultural trade barriers in the context of regional negotiations, opting to hold that issue for multilateral trade talks. The recent trade pact between the United States and Chile--the first ever between the United States and a South American nation--may prove the exception rather than the rule.

Kristof mentions one important sphere for possible improvement in U.S. policy toward the region--corruption. "The State Department publishes an influential annual report on human rights abroad," he writes. "Treasury could publish a similar accounting of corruption abroad." Yet when it comes to corruption in Latin America, the United States would do well to look a little closer to home. For every corrupt Latin official pocketing a bribe, a foreign multinational is often extending it. Argentine journalist Andres Oppenheimer's outstanding Blindfolded: The United States and the Business of Corruption in Latin America (Buenos Aires: Editorial Sudamericana, 2001) chronicles the role of U.S. companies such as Citibank and IBM in dirty dealings throughout the region. Enforcement of U.S. laws dealing with American corporate corruption abroad has been abysmal.

At bottom, it shouldn't be too surprising that the Bush administration has yet to develop an overall policy framework (beyond trade) toward the region. What single strategy can deal with immigration from places as diverse as Mexico and Haiti, political chaos in Venezuela, economic debacle in Argentina, drug production in Peru and Bolivia, civil war in Colombia, or the uncertainty of an eventual post-Castro Cuba? Given other issues on the U.S. foreign-policy agenda, small symbolic gestures toward Latin America (such as the Chile trade pact or recent half-hearted U.S. efforts to end Venezuela's crisis) will remain the norm--come hell or high water.

Carlos Lozada is the managing editor of Foreign Policy magazine.