Resilience of Regionalism in Latin America and the Caribbean

Development and Autonomy

Kenneth A. Loparo, J. Briceño-Ruiz, Kenneth A. Loparo, J. Briceño-Ruiz

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781137328373
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Trade & Tariffs
• Index: Politics & International Relations

As regionalisation becomes an increasingly hot topic, the authors explain why regionalism has been most successful in Latin America and analysecurrent processes and opinions of possible future developments in the region, including the Caribbean, Central America, Brazil, and Mexico.

Part I

The Thematic Perspectives

1

Geopolitics and Integration: A South American Perspective

Andrés Rivarola Puntigliano

Introduction

Regarded as populist, conflict-driven or nationalists, geopoliticians have generally been confronted with suspicion by the academic community. After World War II, geopolitics was associated with Nazi-oriented antiliberal ideas and, later on, with realist right-wing military circles. Yet, in recent years, the concept of geopolitics has become more widespread as an analytical dimension. A reason for this can be found in the shifts of the international system, where the end of the Cold War and the increasing limits of power of the remaining superpower (the US) are leading to new definitions. The global power architecture is increasingly regarded as ‘multipolar’, and these poles are identified with certain core nation-states. Even if there is continuity here with the established view of nation-states as central nodes of the international system, the new viewpoint regards these as too weak to become nodes of the system by themselves. Hence, some pundits prefer to speak of them as ‘nuclear states’ of broader ‘civilizations’ (Huntington, 2002), as parts of ‘a world of regions’ (Katzenstein, 2005) or of broader ‘regional states’ (Ohmae, 1995).

To a greater or lesser extent, the geographic dimension is being ‘reincorporated’ in social science analysis, from different points of view. The new ‘geographies of power’ are under scrutiny; if not challenging the traditional nation-state-centered approach, at least taking into account its erosion. No doubt the emergence of the European Union (EU) as a new regional bloc with features of a state (see De Lombaerde and Michael Schulz, 2009) is part of this. In the form of visions or realpolitik, regionalism and bloc-building is becoming a mode of state organization that increasingly overlaps the central units in the current system of nation-states. But studies also point out that these trends go beyond Europe (Lawson, 2009). As our study suggests, South America is an interesting case where one can analyze the emergence of a new ‘geopolitical region’. Since the concept of ‘region’ involves different dimensions – cultural, economic or spatial – studies of this phenomenon should not avoid taking into account geopolitical perspectives.

Thus, a point of departure of the study is to emphasize the importance of the word ‘reincorporated’ (see above) with respect to the geopolitical and geographical dimensions. Along these lines, the article shows that there is in Latin America a long tradition of geopolitical thinking supporting the idea of integration, which has contributed to generating support for ‘regionalization’. This concept can be defined as the growth of societal integration within a region, and the often undirected processes of social and economic interaction that follow it (Hurrel, 1995, p. 32). It might also be associated with ‘regionalism’, as the ‘ideological project’ for the ‘construction of a regionalist order’ (Farrel et al., 2005, pp. 8–9) in a specified geographical space that we call ‘region’.¹ Without denying these useful definitions, in this study we choose also to link this concept to ‘space and geography’, which have correctly been described as a ‘sadly neglected stepchild in all social theory’ (Harvey, 1985, p. 141). Thus, a main concern of this chapter is to recommend that economic, political, social and cultural (e.g. identity) initiatives (or ideologies) for fostering integration should be analyzed with respect to the geographic space(s) towards which these are directed. Geopolitics is a good tool to understand this linkage.

In relation to South America, this chapter holds that proposals such as the creation of a common state, a confederation, a customs union, and other forms of advanced political and economic integration are not new ideas. They have been recurrent themes since before independence from the Iberian powers. There are, of course, many vantage points from which to analyze this issue. The choice here is to focus on relevant political actors and thinkers whose ideas and actions concerning geopolitics, or the geographical and national dimension of the conception of states, are associated with goals of South American regional integration.

The theoretical part will pay attention to a discussion of the way in which the concept of geopolitics will be used in the study. In our view, this concept cannot be separated from what is a central methodological theme in the research framework of this book: the relevance of history. Contrary to what is generally said about South American regionalism, the process did not start in the 1980s or 1990s. As for Latin America as a whole, current South American regionalism should be regarded as the surface of prior layers of integration movements. What is today known as ‘globalization’ certainly set new conditions for the process. But one must bear in mind that, in this later phase in the longue durée, the conformation of what has been called the post-Columbian ‘capitalistworld economy’ (Arrighi, 2006) has been characterized by an intensive dynamism of centrifugal and centripetal forces of state formation and destruction. Thus, to understand current regional expressions and analyze their strategic scope one has to grasp the waves² of regionalisms that preceded them.

To speak further of methodological concerns, this study is grounded in the belief that there are no political actions without ideology. In this sense, we raise a caveat about the use of the word ‘pragmatism’ to describe foreign policy or development orientations. At the root of things one will always find ideologies and beliefs guiding actions, and these cannot be understood with materialist analytical tools alone. Hence, the choice of exploring traditions of geopolitical thinking allows us to grasp a dimension of strategic thinking that incorporates both a materialist and an idealist side. Along these lines, the analytical framework for our analysis of geopolitics and regional integration is that, at bottom, it is a form of discussing three basic themes: development strategy (political economy), one’s place in the world (territorial space) and the issue of nationhood (identity).

The study starts with a theoretical discussion, ‘Grappling with “geopolitics” ’, in which the concept of geopolitics will be analyzed in more depth. The next section, called ‘The conception period’, deals with the use of the ‘geographic dimension’ in South America, and its relation to ‘integration’, with the focus on the period of independence. A central argument here is that the formation of the new states implied a setback for the idea of integration. Yet, in the following part, ‘the inception period’ (mid- and late 19th century), it is argued that, in spite of strong opposition, integrationist ideas survived and evolved through intellectual and policy-oriented regionalist initiatives. In fact, during this period of apparent regionalist stagnation the bases were laid for the next period, which is analyzed in the section called ‘Geopolitics of integration through new actors’. This period starts during the early years of the 20th century, when the concept of geopolitics began to be used. One can see here a strong relinking with the conceptional ideas, but mixing them with new rational models of economic development. During the mid-20th century, integration was also more clearly formulated on a geopolitical basis. In the final section, ‘Continentalism and globalization’, the study deals with more contemporary ideas and actions that are in search of geopolitical convergence as a sort of ‘continental’ answer to the challenge of globalization and development.

Grappling with ‘geopolitics’

When scholars use (to uphold or criticize) the concept of geopolitics they usually follow a neo-realist definition, concerned with security and conflict, and following a nation-state-centric perspective (Rivarola Puntigliano, 2011). With respect to integration issues, one example can be found in Andrew Hurrel’s analysis of ‘systemic theories’. Geopolitics is here placed under the neo-realist theoretical umbrella, explaining regionalism as the result of responses towards international power alignments at an international level (Hurrel, 1995, p. 38). Other examples along the same track can be found in Karl Kaltenthaler and Frank O. Mora’s (2002, p. 78) analysis on the formation of the Common Market of the South (MERCOSUR); or, more recently, in Amado Cervo’s article about the characteristics of the formation process of UNASUR (Union of Nations of the South) (Cervo, 2010, p. 25). If we look at more critical perspectives on the use of the concept of geopolitics, Barry Buzan and Ole Wæver, for example, hold that realist theory has evolved ‘away from geopolitical and historical specificity towards abstract “systemic” theory which operates with “units” that are defined as alike and non-located, i.e. the basic, simple premise of international politics that states are non-mobile, is ignored’ (Buzan and Wæver, 2008, p. 68). Proposing the concept of ‘regional security complex’ (RSC) for analysis of new forms of state organization, they argue that geopolitics matters as part of a political framework (Buzan and Wæver, 2008, p. 68). Although rejecting the neo-realist view concerning geopolitics, they are actually still attached to it; for example, in the analysis of South America, where geopolitics is associated with war escalation, suspicion or threat perceptions (Buzan and Wæver, 2008, p. 314).

A problem here is that this neo-realist association may lead to a one-dimensional view, often linking realism with conflict and a nation-state-centered outlook. One way of escaping it is to turn to a more systemic approach, since, as Hurrel (1995, p. 339) says, ‘systemic theories underline the importance of the broader political and economic structures within which regionalist schemes are embedded’. Yet, he only identifies two, ‘neo-realism’ and ‘structural interdependence’, the latter endorsing the neo-liberal institutionalist model (Baylis et al., 2008, pp. 131–33). Hurrel does not mention other systemic perspectives such as ‘world-system’ (Arrighi, 2007) or the more actual ‘global history’ approach, probably because these actually say little about regionalism (Pomeranz, 2000). Yet, one can turn to the period before World War I for systemic views from which one might look beyond current paradigms. In fact, Samuel Huntington’s (2002) critique of the neo-liberal claim of an ‘end of history’ is a good example of looking back to old models, in his case by remixing the largely French-inspired 19th-century ideas of ‘civilization’ into a new context. Another approximation to this issue can be found in the Germanic emphasis on the role of geography and history.

One of the most relevant was the German political geographer Friedrich Ratzel (1844–1904), who linked geography to the understanding of the historical process of change of nations and states. One of his cardinal principles was the organic union of humans and the land they inhabit (Hunter, 1983, p. xxiv), but there was nothing static in this. He argued that there was a constant ‘spatial motif’ of movement whereby states integrate and disintegrate in a process of growth and diminution (Ratzel, 1969, p. 18). Ratzel’s determinism rested in his belief in the increasing size of states, or what he called the ‘expansion of geographical horizons’ (Ratzel, 1969, p. 18). This motif was, according to him, as old as civilization and (originally) had cultural, political and religious expansion as major driving forces. With industrialization, these forces were surpassed by the increasing dominance of commerce ‘as a powerful impetus on all drives toward expansion’ (Ratzel, 1969, p. 18).

One of Ratzel’s central theses was that ‘the state is never at rest’, and there is a constant redefinition of lebensraum, a concept that can be translated as ‘habitat’.³ With industrialization, the pressures for changes of state structures rapidly increased, since new technological, economic and social imperatives pushed forward the need for larger (and/or stronger) state units. Ratzel therefore envisaged that the international system was heading for a new phase, which he called ‘continental history’. The core actors here would be, in his view, continental powers such as North America, Australia, Asiatic Russia, and perhaps even South America.⁴

His ‘continental’ outlook was an inspiring theme for many, but it lacked a theory of the state as a guide on how to steer in the mist of new systemic economic coordinates. That empty hole was filled by someone whom Kasperson and Minghi (1969, p. 8) described as ‘one of the first and major post-Ratzelian disciples’, the Swedish political scientist Johan Rudolf Kjellén (1864–1922). Kjellén envisaged a theory of the state that had as its major goal assuring its sovereignty. For this purpose the state, according to Kjellén, was in need of geopolitical scope, linked to issues such as industrialization and economic ‘autocracy’; not meaning isolation, but being able to determine the conditions that benefited its own development. Like Ratzel, Kjellén held that the state was a ‘living organism’. If it wanted to survive, it had to be intertwined with the ‘spirit’ of its nation, its inhabitants and their relation to the soil. Thus, the identification of an optimal lebensraum (geographic dimension) was, in the long run, worthless without strong bonds of loyalty from the population of that geographical space.

From a Kjellénian point of view, surviving in the system demanded the understanding of a complex ‘science of the state’, linking geography, nationalism and economic policy. But the understanding of the complex relation between these elements, in turn, required perspective: on the one hand, through history, to unfold the mysteries of the relation of the people to their soil, their cultural bonds and attachment to states; on the other, through a global outlook, to look beyond one’s own worldview, trying to grasp the possibilities and hurdles of the broader environment in which one’s own unit of analysis is placed. This last point is, today, one the most highlighted around geopolitics, linking it to conflict and a more realist interpretation. It is, though, important to remark that ‘geopolitics’, a concept that Kjellén coined in 1899 (Tunander, 2001, p. 452), was intended to be only one part of a more complex ‘science of the state’ (Holdar, 1992, p. 310). While the later realist focus on geopolitics was directed towards ‘conflict’ or ‘hegemony’, Kjellén’s geopolitical approach also took into account issues such as political economy, sovereignty and national identity. It was very much in this Kjellénian fashion that what we will here call ‘classical geopolitics’ became widespread in South America during the early 19th century. Yet, it is important to underscore that the notions of linkage between geography, nation and economy did not arrive in South America with European or US 19th-century thinkers. Geographic notions, as part of the construction of the state and new ideas of nationality, had been a local concern since the colonial period.

The conception period

It is said that the first systematic geographical survey of the region that we today call Latin America was made in the 1570s, by the official geographer and cosmographer of the Council of Indies, López de Velazco, who identified three subregions within the Spanish territories: the Northern Indies, the Western Indies (the Caribbean) and the Southern Indies (Barton, 2003, p. 40). It was then, as the ‘Southern Indies’, that South America received what might have been one of its first official recognitions as geographi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction: Regional Integration – Linking Past and Present
• Part I: The Thematic Perspectives
• Part II: The Subregional Perspectives
• Part III: The Country Perspectives
• Conclusion: About the Endurance of Latin American Regionalism
• Index