PRIME MINISTER P.J. Patterson yesterday urged the region to return to what he called "its ideological origins" in an effort to influence the impact of globalisation on the economies of developing countries.
Mr. Patterson who was addressing the opening ceremony of the Socialist International Committee for Latin America and the Caribbean at the Jamaica Conference Centre, downtown Kingston, also called for renewed solidarity between the region and other developing countries in Africa and Asia.
Latin America had played a substantial part in shaping the views of the developing world but in recent years it seemed to have withdrawn from this leadership role, he said.
"This withdrawal has undoubtedly served to weaken the solidarity of the South and has created worrying fissures in its ranks," Mr. Patterson told the over 300 delegates who are attending the conference which ends today. (Saturday).
He added that the it would be a major tactical error for Latin America to opt out of an alliance with the rest of the South.
"None of us can in the end stand alone, if we are to effectively harness the forces of globalisation and liberalisation in the interest of our own development," the Prime Minister said.
He said the quest for growth at the national and international levels required inspiration from a humanitarian ethic which was embedded in the socialist perspective and not in the logic of market-driven neo-liberalism.
Mr. Patterson noted that with changes in technology, the access to instant communication worldwide had altered the political workings in developing countries.
"These profound changes oblige us to re-examine our political systems, our national institutions and how we as Socialists respond," he said.
He said, however, that reliance on the state to solve all human problems, had no more validity than the proposition that unbridled market forces were the remedy for every human malady.
