Who we Are

Enlaces America:
Building Capacity—Forging Connections

January 2008: Enlaces America Bids Farewell...but the Work Moves Forward

When we launched the Enlaces América project in 2002, we hoped that our efforts as adviser, facilitator, and support center for Latino immigrant organizations might someday culminate in a vibrant transnational network of Latino immigrants. We also dreamed of creating an international space where immigrant leaders could exchange ideas and learn from one another. Although these seemed like distant dreams six years ago, I am delighted to report that they both have come true.

The National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities (NALACC) is rapidly consolidating as a transnational voice for Latino immigrants, firmly rooted in its community-based membership. The very first Latin American Migrant Community Summit was held last year in Mexico, with more than 1,000 participants from more than 20 countries Meanwhile, our host organization, the Heartland Alliance for Human Needs & Human Rights has greatly expanded its own international work, bringing its expertise on protection of human rights and integrated mental and physical health to regions suffering from violent conflict and poverty.

The energy and dynamism of NALACC and the Migrant Summit have far exceeded our hopes. Both these initiatives have moved beyond the stage of needing an “incubator” space such as Enlaces América. Therefore, we have decided to formally close the Enlaces América project, as of January 31, 2008. We urge you to stay in touch by visiting the NALACC and Migrant Summit websites and by subscribing to the NALACC blog, coming soon at www.perspectivasmigrantes.org.

 

 

Program History:

Enlaces América has been an adviser, facilitator, and support center for transnational Latino and Caribbean immigrant organizations committed to building healthy communities both in the United States and in their countries of origin. In fulfilling this role, we enabled immigrant community leaders to take on leading roles in domestic and international policy advocacy processes in areas such as immigration and international economic development.

We believe that organized immigrant communities can and must play a role in designing the policies that will shape our country and our region. Even as they build their communities here in the United States, Latino immigrants have continued to care about and support their communities in their countries of origin. This emphasis on local community development—both in the United States and in the country of origin— gives Latino immigrant leaders a uniquely transnational perspective on such policy issues as immigration, trade, and economic development.

We see an emerging cadre of community- based leaders who are poised to take on a more visible leadership role at the national level. But they face a profound challenge. Underfunded and overextended immigrant-led organizations have very little time to rationalize and assimilate the information being accumulated in day-to-day struggles. Our leadership capacity-building programs aimed to enhance the ability of organized Latino immigrant communities to work collaboratively with civil society allies in the US and Latin America as transnational change agents. This effort looped back to the underlying rationale for all our work: to move towards dignified, equitable, and sustainable ways of life for communities throughout the Americas.

Because we believe that the problems facing our hemisphere are complex and interrelated, Enlaces América was also committed to multi-sectoral alliances and multi-disciplinary analysis. Too many efforts to build cross-sectoral alliances start from the utilitarian notion that different groups can be “brought on board” to a particular agenda. In contrast, we aim to meet organizations where they are and look for underlying common interests that can be nurtured and developed. We also offered a transnational perspective to organizations whose primary focus is local or national. Finally, we promoted cross-sectoral collaborations, particularly among organizations working on immigrants’ rights, international development policies, environmental issues, and rural and community development.

Mexico-U.S. Advocates Network

Current University of Chicago Human Rights Program Director Susan Gzesh was the director of the Mexico-U.S. Advocates Network from its inception in 1995 to mid-2001. The initiative was dedicated to improving communication between Mexican and U.S. human and advocates on migration policy issues, and represented an innovative model for transnational civil society alliances.

The aim of the network’s efforts in the U.S. was to reframe the discussion of immigration policy and enforcement in order to integrate an understanding of the structural nature of Mexico-U.S. migration and the relationship between migration, development and trade policies. Mexico-U.S. Advocates Network staff in Mexico and the U.S. played key roles in the 1996 founding and subsequent consolidation of the Regional Network of Civil Organizations on Migration, the regional civil society forum which coordinates non-governmental participation in the intergovernmental Regional Conference on Migration.