26 MAY 1923, Page 8

THE

ENGLISH-SPEAKING WORLD.

BY EVELYN WRENCH.

A MERICAN comment on the recent Pan-American -C1 Conference at Santiago de Chile, the fifth gathering of its kind since 1889, implies disappointment with the . paucity of the results obtained. Generalizations are always dangerous on so complex a matter as Pan-American relationships, but the general inference to be drawn from the newspaper comment is that Latin-Americanism was a more living force than Pan-Americanism at Santiago. Rightly or wrongly, the Monroe doctrine in certain States of Latin America is interpreted as the right of North Americans to interfere in South American affairs rather than as a guarantee of political -independence against European conquest. When President Monroe and Canning enunciated the Monroe Doctrine because EurOpean monarchs were casting hinging eyes towards South America, it met a very definite need ; but to-day, when disputes arise, South America might turn just as readily to the League of Nations as to a Pan-American gathering. Such, at least, appears to be the moral of the abortive discussions at Santiago.