New Regionalism and Global Economic Governance

Abstract

With the European Union, the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA), Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), ASEAN or the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) - just to mention a few - the globalizing political economy is characterized by the persistence and even new building of regions. Since the 1990s, a ‘second wave’ of regionalism has been discovered by a broad academic community,¹ reminding us of the ‘first wave’ of building free trade areas, customs unions and common markets in the 1950s and 1960s. However, there is an ongoing controversy as to the nature of what is new about regionalism compared to the ‘old’. Old regionalism has usually been associated with the protectionist provisions of European integration on one hand and Southern integration schemes based on import substitution policies on the other. Still, the phenomenon of new regionalism is seen as a protectionist measure while, at the same time, being associated with openness (open regionalism). This indicates a rather contradictory or even paradoxical nature of new regionalism and is linked to the question often asked about the relation between new regionalism and globalization. It is answered in many ways: from regionalism being a ‘stepping stone’ to regionalism being a ‘stumbling block’ with regard to globalization. Studies come to the (rather inconclusive) conclusion that new regionalism may ‘represent globalization’ or attempt to ride on it, to regulate it or to resist it (Hveem 2000: 71).²