Freedom's Ring.

It has been fascinating to watch governments change over the past decade or so. Fifty years after World War II, nearly a century since the conflagration of the Great War that kicked off the bloody and sad 20th century, we're back to making real choices. Think about it: Monarchs were in power in many places not quite a lifetime ago. Today, communists in many countries have to run for office where they once simply maintained control. With a few glaring exceptions, democracies offering actual choices are the model. In most of these countries, a version of open, free capitalism is ascendant. We're down to worrying about the exceptions (Saudia Arabia, North Korea, China), not swaying the mass of world governments toward one political pole or another.

More to the point, Latin America has, as much as any region, led the way. Whatever your political bent or grievance, whatever your history in relation to the despots of old, they are gone. Latin American voters now are being asked in a serious and forthright way to select their leaders, and to take responsibility for their vote. As Mexican voters go to the polls at the close of this edition, it will be their second chance in more than seven decades to truly make a choice, not rubberstamp the candidate of a political machine. They'll have to live with that choice, too, but no matter. It's theirs to make, and that's what really matters.

Greg Brown 

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P.S. In the February edition of LATIN TRADE, we published a list of female executives--selected by the region's best management recruiters--who should be CEOs within a decade. Due to an editing error, we neglected to mention the help we got in the selection process from Macaya & Suarez Battan Asesores in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Santiago, Chile.