| Description |
Countries across the globe have formed regional integration schemes for many reasons. Liberalization of trade, greater negotiating power in the world arena, and the acceleration of industrialization are only a few of the many objectives of integration processes. Using the literature in a number of disciplines, this paper first looks at why economic, political and social integration is an attractive goal for the Andean countries: Colombia, Venezuela, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. This paper analyzes the formation of the Andean Pact and uses it as a basis to determine if economic regional integration is beneficial to developing countries. The closed-economic policies of the individual member countries in the Pact as well as the Pact from 1969 to 1989 resulted in economic stagnation. After 1989, the member states reorganized the Pact into the Andean Community (ANCOM) and abandoned many of their closed-economic policies. This paper looks at the new goals of ANCOM as well as the extent to which they are being realized. Finally, a hypothesis on possible courses of action is brought up. By using the Andean Community as evidence, this paper concludes that developing countries have much to benefit through the use of regional integration. |
