+ The first is a commonality of cultural values and identity. Another is the subsidization of the oil needs of 14 Caribbean countries by Venezuela, which sells fuel to them at 40 per cent off the world price. State borders are becoming more porous than before, people are meeting and mixing more than before. Even quite conservative new models for measuring overall success in development, such as the so called Happy Planet Index, indicate that life-conditions in the US, Sweden, Germany and other similar countries reached an all-time high in th 1970s and haved steadily deteriorated since then. Another response, complementary to this, has been to build regional associations or regional blocs. CHALLENGES WITH INTEGRATING 15 SOVEREIGN STATES • The High Cost/Difficulty in doing business • Geography/ Inefficiencies in Transportation • Different legal traditions and systems • Restricted freedom of movement • No Currency convertibility • Lack of Political will • … 2007. 1. 6. Donors and Institutions Supporting Regional Cooperation and level integration. A commitment to open regionalism and deep integration would help address some of these problems and create a healthy basis for regional and global trade integration. 2. My second point today is that regional politics needs to be recognised more than before as a relevant arena of political initiative in its own right. The elected parliament should not be subordinate to regional non-elected bodies, but the extent of its powers needs to be controlled from lower levels. Recent key developments, such as the text and ratification process of the Lisbon Treaty, the formation of Europe’s new global economic policy, and the struggles over the working time, services and chemical legislation at the European level, show that corporate interests and narrowly defined economic goals still tend to dominate EU-policies. Regional economic blocs are not new. The USA carries the main burden of classical warfare, the EU steps in economically and logistically in the aftermath of the war, takinmg care of crisis management. 0000007621 00000 n 0000002697 00000 n Challenges of Regional Integration By Thomas Wallgren * Presentation given at International Conference of governments and social movements “Regional Integration: an opportunity to face the crises” (21 and 22 July 2009, stuff Asunción del Paraguay) <<5E04D95EF02C1F4A979590C56857CBCC>]>> He serves as an elected member of the city council of Helsinki and is co-chair of the social-democratic group. * Economic policies of regions should learn from the failures of the neo-liberal experiments in the EU and elsewhere: + A Latin American Central Bank issuing a common currencie that may in the long run function as a (regional?) (3) Regional cooperation for global governance needs to be built democratically from below. Regional trade arrangements also played a role. In Africa, many such challenges affect poor peopleÕs lives in areas ranging from human security and mobility to rural livelihoods, trade, infrastructure, food security, environment The strong efforts by trade unions, left governments, environmentalists, women’s movements and others to change the balance of forces in Europe have so far met with, at best, half-success. In recent years the increasingly lively alliances throughout the region of indigenous and other emancipatory movements, that has given one country a president coming from the indigenous movements and another country a constitution that recognises Mother Earth is of particular interest for people on all continents who are searching for new political tools, ideas and visions. In view of recent experiences elsewhere this is likely to be more important for post-national democracy than computer-intensity. The Implications of ‘The Global Crisis’ in relation to the challenges and the strategic Regional Policy Alternatives facing the Southern African Development Community, COMUNICADO De los participantes de la Conferencia “Integración Regional: una oportunidad frente a la crisis”, Asunción, Paraguay, 21-22 Julio, 2009, Activities organized by the regional networks, Actividades Organizadas por las Redes Regionales, Regional Integration and alternatives Theory, Teoria de Integración Regional y Alternativas, “Conferencia Internacional de gobiernos y movimientos sociales “Integración regional: una oportunidad frente a las crisis”, Conference on “Regional Integration: an Opportunity Presented by the Crisis”. As a result, African governments have concluded a very large number of regional integration arrangements, several of which have 0000004040 00000 n Nevertheless I want to welcome the quality and direction of development in many South and Latin American countries in the last few years and the efforts and the decisive contribution of ordinary people from the struggling classes to them. It should also lead the world out of its multiple crises on the long-term. 0000455612 00000 n ASEAN’s idea of integration is to see it as a step towards full-scale globalization, a process that is termed “open regionalism.”. Social policy, workers rights, health and education, environment have all suffered from a subordination to common economic policies. 237 0 obj <> endobj 3. The Bretton Woods institutions and the WTO-framwork have been insufficient or even dysfunctional for development, ecological responsibility and economic stability, especially for the global South. GLOBAL AND HISTORICAL PREMISES OF REGIONAL COOPERATION, Regional integration in the context of collapsing neo-liberalism, authoritarian capitalism and the search for cultural alternatives. Three: the peoples must always have effective control, before the fact and after the fact, of the balance of powers between regional and national authorities. In the great wars of the Bush regime – on Iraq and Afghanistan – a new obscene division of labour is emerging between the trans-Atlantic forces. 11. Box MP167 Mount Pleasant Harare, Zimbabwe. Civil society must not only provide a check to both the state and the market, but it must be the leading force in the new economics. 14. Globally the political debates seem to be moving from a discussion of separate crises to a discussion of inter-connected crises: of the finance sector, the world economy, political governance, food, water, development and climate. The deficit is structural: decision-making in the EU is so undemocratic that, ironically, the EU, if it would be a nation, would not qualify for membership in the EU. Especially strong integration -- like the European Union -- can lead to the loss of unique minority cultures within a region. The EU is now the most advanced model of regional integration globally. 0000004149 00000 n 0000047083 00000 n Part 1. challenges to regional integration in africa: the case of the revived east africa community 2000-2012 gichohi marvin muhammad r50/69883/2011 a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment for the degree of master of arts in international studies.institute of diplomacy and international studies, university of nairobi august 2015 The challenges confronting us today cannot be met by either neoliberalism or the old developmentalist model. The new politics of global security that we need, must, as Gandhi and others have clearly seen long back, be linked to the construction of pro-people and environmentally sound development models. 0000050482 00000 n We must, however, humbly admit that the Nordic identity has weakened in the last 15 years as we have been been overwhelmed by globalisation and EU-integration. This is a video giving information on Factors Hindering Regional Integration, under the topic Challenges and Opportunity of Regional Integration . endstream endobj 238 0 obj <> endobj 239 0 obj <> endobj 240 0 obj <> endobj 241 0 obj <>/Shading<>/Font<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageC]/ExtGState<>>> endobj 242 0 obj <> endobj 243 0 obj <>stream They need to include very tight transparency regulation and, as I believe, innovative, radical anti-trust regulation. For this, effective, almost excessive formal veto powers by smaller members states in the regional organisations are needed to counter the effective and lasting, greater political weight of larger members.