1997 enlargement of the Conference of American States

  

The Conference of American States carried out its biggest enlargement since its founding in July 1997, when the majority of the Caribbean island nations became part of the organization, including Jamaica, Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. This left only the Antilles and Trinidad and Tobago as the only independent Caribbean states not in the CAS by the end of 1997.

All of the members of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) with the exception of the Antilles (due to its conflicting political status) were seriously considering CAS membership during the 1980s, especially after Alaska, Belize, and Greenland successfully joined the Conference. They were formally recognized as potential candidates in September 1988, and officially became candidates in January 1990. With the exception of Jamaica, all of them had close economic ties with the CAS "Inner Four" countries, mainly as a popular destination for CAS tourists. There was a lot of support in the Conference for the inclusion of the OECS countries for this reason, and also because of their political alliance on the side of Western Anglo-America during the Cold War. Their history of relations with the CAS meant that there were few changes that needed to be made to their economies and legal systems to comply with the Toscouné criteria that was set in 1987. By the early 1990s the process was underway, and the nine countries were all accepted as members of the Conference starting on 1 July 1997. They also all became part of the Lincoln Area in December 2000, which reduces border controls for the citizens of its participating states.