Governmental and Economic Systems of Honduras - Coursework Example

ANALYSIS OF HONDURAS POLITICAL, GOVERNMENTAL AND ECONOMIC SYSTEMS INTRODUCTION Honduras is one of the nations located in Central America and its official name is the Republic of Honduras, referred as the Republic of Honduras due to the fact British Honduras also existed during the colonial times. The neighboring states of Honduras include El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. Moreover, the Republic of Honduras borders with the Pacific Ocean and has a gulf that connects to the Caribbean Sea1. Honduras politics, economy and culture traces back to the sixteenth century. Furthermore, the Mesoamerican cultures related to the Honduras include the Maya especially after Spain took over in the early 1500s. After conquering, Spain made the people of Honduras take on their culture, religion, language; Honduras’ governance was under Spanish colonizers until 1821 when they attained their independence. Honduras has been a subject of societal challenges and volatility in politics, factors that put it among the poverty-stricken states in Central America and around the globe. Honduras is over 100,000 km2, slightly larger than the state of Tennessee, with more than 8 million people with most of its history, especially in culture, relating to the Western Caribbean Zone. Additionally, despite the low poverty level, the country has an economy that produces different minerals, agricultural products (sugar cane, coffee, tropical fruit) and material for the global textile industry. Decisively, this paper is a comprehensive analysis of Honduras political, governmental and economic events that are critical and contributed to parts of its development or failure. Political SYSTEM and Governance The political governance of Honduras is unique and uncommon in which the president of the republic serves the prominent dual roles as head of state and of the government. Noteworthy, the government of Honduras exercises executive power while the National Congress serves as the parliament2. As a multiparty political system, the most dominant parties are the National and Liberal parties of Honduras. Moreover, unlike in most modern day political systems, Honduras Parliament and Cabinet have very little significant impact on the state’s Judicial System3. Currently, Honduras government operates under the 1981 Constitution which has imposing processes, especially since the executive exercises the majority of power under this constitution. However, this is not the only difference; in fact, roles that crucially belong to the executive in other government systems are under the National Congress as per the Honduras Constitution. Moreover, the judiciary appoints members of the unicameral National Congress but this is not an indicator that the judiciary is higher than the congress in hierarchical power. The constitution of Honduras dictates its own amendment procedures that legislature must follow; however, eight articles are absolute and no circumstances can lead to their alteration. The most popular of the eight are the two concerning Honduras having a republican form of government and restricting the re-election of presidents. The Honduras constitution forms the basis of governance and political practices in the state. Moreover, the 1981 Honduras Constitution also contains a sector that creates a basis for the supervision and implementation of elections. The Superior Electoral Tribunal is an independent organization which controls all elections; the legislature and National Congress have no power to alter the electoral process. Typically, the Honduras party system bases on two parties that hold a legacy of dominating every election since the 1920s; obviously, other contending parties feel they do not stand a chance creating a lot of monotony and biasness in the system4. War and insecurity are common challenges for states in Central America as indicated by history; however, Honduras endured peace in the 1980s even as neighboring countries suffered through conflicts for years. Honduras as a strategy to maintain peace, allowed the United States to conduct military operations from Soto Cano Airbase in Honduras, a strategic airbase that supported many military operations in Central and South America. In the 1990s, gang violence became prevalent within Honduras and is still among their biggest challenges even today. Even though the political system and governance of Honduras has multiple accomplishments when it comes to following the right legislative and constitutional practices, augmented levels of crime eliminate all the developments made within the span of more than a decade. The youth and teenagers are the core proprietors of violence in Honduras by engaging in the trafficking of cocaine to the United States5. Gangs and violence were not an issue until 1990s when young people started abducting, trafficking people, rustling armaments among other crimes. The United States FBI considers Honduras as a hub of crime and violence with statistics showing that over 3000 people in the country participate in gang activities. However, one of the major prospects by the government is reducing the violence and crime by implementation of different initiatives, some of which involve the United States authoritative bodies. Honduras has experienced challenges with the heads of state and government over the recent years; in fact, some people might argue that they are facilitators of crime and violence that threaten the country’s governance and political system6. For instance, President Manuel facilitated a lot of controversy between Honduras and neighboring states; moreover, in 2008, he faced a lot of criticism for refusing to follow budget procedures as indicated in the constitution. The following year, Manuel attempted to alter the constitution by advocating for a referendum; conversely, the Supreme Court sanctioned him but he still proceeded to a point where soldiers had to detain him secretly. After Honduras government appointing an interim president, the situation attracted a lot of attention and most states perceived it as a coup. Moreover, the electoral system also received a lot of condemnation because of advocating for an interim president that would govern the state for more than a year7. Honduras electoral system has also not been the best with many disagreements during elections and the processes that apply in announcing the president. Honduras has had seven presidents form the two dominant parties and in every election there are controversies especially on the credibility of the presidents i.e. where they were born etc. Generally, the electoral system has ample weaknesses, most of which affect the political and governance systems; for instance, one would question Manuel Zelaya’s election as the president. Moreover, the internal party elections do not follow any of the set regulations and half of the Honduras population does not vote, yet some of past controversies emanate from excess numbers of votes tallied8. The electoral system contributes to decreased faith from the public, especially for the state leaders. Apparently, the political affiliations of Honduras are similar to those in other countries in Central Africa when it comes to inefficiency and corruption; additionally, the political and civil rights such as freedom of expression and liberty have multiple restrictions as a result of the written constitution. However, the written constitution is not the key facilitator of the governance challenges; in fact, democracy and democratic institutions do very little to contribute to the quantity and quality state services. Additionally, the limited state resources act as an excuse for the poor governance in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. HONDURAS ECONOMIC HISTORY AND SYSTEM Honduras has a vast economy based on a free market where agricultural products dominate, assertively, coffee vastly grown in the country holding a quarter of all exports. The other products include bananas, cultivated shrimp and textile for the clothing and other industries; additionally, Honduras has all-encompassing woodland and minerals that share a small part of the state’s economy9. Among the biggest challenges is deforestation where a significant portion of the population adopts the behavior of cutting down trees but in some cases large fires result from agricultural methods. High levels of unemployment also contribute to the poverty situation in Honduras with only 75% of population having jobs and other sources of income. The coffee and cultivated shrimp’s plantations have helped reduce unemployment over the years, but it is still a threat to Honduras economy. In fact, at the end of the 20th Century, the inflation rate was very high but after the government put focus on these projects, it reduced by 1% and since then, the economy has had better times. However, Honduras is still among the pitiable states in Latin and Central America. Unfortunately, this has forced some citizens to migrate because the country has very little development. Over the past 14yrs, the state has had constant microeconomic policies that are relative to its ideological foreign policy, which is not commendable for such a period, especially because lenders such as IMF need borrowers to execute operational changes. The Hurricane Mitch hit the Honduras economy hard but the repercussion was advantageous because there was a cancellation of some debts10. Assertively, Honduras’ unused land and limited resources act as the core impediments to the development of the country’s economy. Luckily, the country has a lot of land that the government can exploit but the lack of resources and other economic challenges affect this especially because most of the land is steep and unfertile hence it will require ample work to become productive. The condition of the land cannot apply for agriculture also but the government is reluctant to taking steps with manufacturing industry having only textile industries and simple agricultural factories. Central America has other countries that have advanced economic systems with large domestic markets; evidently, Honduras cannot keep up with such competition that puts it a disadvantage. Honduras Pragmatic Foreign Policy Based on previous occurrences in Honduras, democracy a key tool in the realization of the anticipated development. Most educated individuals (elites) from the country are concerned on the consequences of democratic precepts violation, which will rock it out from beneficial interaction with other states. Due to this issue, the country bhas to make compromises in its operation just as other countries, United States of America, included if it does not want to be observed as an outcast as is the case for North Korea. CONCLUSION and PROSPECTS OF THE FUTURE Significantly, Central America has more than often been termed as a developing world due to the different shortcomings in the economy, development, forms of government and relations on an international scope. This chart is a comparison of Central American countries and the United States. Resolutely, Honduras has multiple threats on economic and political platforms as indicated by the current situation and history; in fact, statistics show that unless these systems improve, the financial system will also fail eventually. However, there is hope for adverse developments especially reflecting on the growth rate for the past three years. Essentially, for adverse development, the country should seriously consider the domestic monetary and fiscal policies. The first step, according to the Political risk model should entail evaluating Honduras ability to implement these policies. The international transaction policy review should come after the government is in control of the domestics risks; however, this requires augmented attention because of Honduras ideological foreign policy that has more negative impact than positive. Over the recent years, the government of Honduras has put significant focus on charter cities as a foundation for attracting trade and investment but the results have been dismal because the economic has had significant downfalls as a result11. The government prospects are on the wrong path their aim should on attracting investors it should be on attaining domestic stability by evaluating factors such as labor flexibility, business environment, social stability, legal systems and government stability in relation to the economy. This approach can definitely apply for Honduras achieving progress especially because the country’s economic environment lacks influential fundamentals. 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