Reply #3: South American Community of Nations - Common Market [View All]

You've got it! Check this out. First we had the EU, now we have...

Latin America is no joke

Stanley A. Weiss International Herald Tribune
Monday, December 27, 2004

U.S. neighbor relations

WASHINGTON When 11 Latin American countries took the first steps toward a regional common market in 1960, dismissive U.S. officials predictably joked that the ill-fated Latin American Free Trade Agreement would generate "more tears than Lafta."

But no one was laughing this month in Peru when all 12 South American nations pledged themselves to an EU-style political and economic community. The South American Community of Nations - which by definition excludes Mexico, the United States and Canada - envisions a common market, a regional constitution and Parliament.

The display of unity in Peru was as much about South America as it was about the North - specifically the United States. A more unified group of South American nations is seen as a way to strengthen their collective bargaining power in trade negotiations with the almighty yankees.

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Indeed, always bound more by geography than ideology, America and its Latin neighbors are drifting apart. As Washington moves to the right, the rest of the hemisphere is moving to the left. The presidents of Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela and Ecuador were all elected by challenging Washington-driven free market reforms that have done little to reduce the region's endemic poverty.

(snip)

http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2004/12/26/opinion/edweiss.html