Escenarios de integración económica latinoamericana

Abstract

This work aims to classify the regional integration initiatives in Latin America, taking into account the characteristics of the countries belonging to each one. To this end, it analyzes political, economic and social variables as central elements for understanding the dynamics of markets and states. Although agreements begin with an expressly commercial motivation, astime goes by these initiatives scale up integration objectives converging towards the design of coordinated economic and social policy actions. The Pacific Alliance is an agreement with a strong emphasis on trade integration within the framework of free competition, while at the other extreme is ALBA, which emphasizes political and social aspects, focusing its actions on state intervention schemes. The main results show that there are more integration initiatives with a commercial emphasis in the region, these are the same in which the member countries have a similar performance in economic variables and a shared vision on the importance of markets. On the other hand, the member countries of interventionist integration agreements reduced their economic and social performance.