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The failure of intervention in Panama: Humiliation in the backyard

Author(s): John Weeks, Andrew Zimbalist

In: Third World Quarterly, Vol 11, No 1 (January), 1989, pp. 1-27

Explores from leftist perspective failure of Reagan Administration to overthrow Noriega in spring 1988 and reasons why US turned against Noriega. Argues also that the internal opposition led by isolated upper class elite and 1988 protests indicated limits of its effectiveness. The authors accept that the July-August 1987 demonstrations did mobilize workers and peasants, but suggest that they were responding to the arrest of a popular politician and expressing popular resentment of World Bank-directed economic policies, rather than specifically opposing Noriega.