El Gran Caribe by Professor Norman Girvan. 2002

Let me begin my reflections with an historical perspective on the development of the idea of the Greater Caribbean, El Gran Caribe, the subject of my lecture. The Puerto Rican historian Antonio Gaztambide-Geigel has argued—in my view persuasively—that the notion of a 'Caribbean region' was invented by the United States at the turn of the 19th century, as a product of its military and economic expansion into the area.