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Mercosur and the European Union

The European Union (EU) and the Common Market of the South (Mercosur) are very different regions that have come to seemingly analogous compromises as far as the operation of their common markets is concerned. Like the EU, Mercosur seems to confirm the textbook logic of integration development from a free trade area to a customs union and then to a common market. Does this mean that well-developed theories of European integration that emphasize certain properties of the European region are useless in explaining and predicting the Mercosur process? This article proposes a framework for comparison of the two blocs that uses selected theories of European integration: neofunctionalism, liberal inter-governmentalism, social constructivism and neo-realism. The framework is applied to the examination of intra-regional cohesion of the two interstate cooperative groups. Comparison of the two unions demonstrates that, despite similar institutional structures and partial set-ups of the common markets, they are qualitatively different processes that are highly conditioned by their unique regional properties. There is therefore no contradiction between Mercosur and the predictions of the Mercosur integration based on the theories of European integration. At the same time, Mercosur is strongly affected by the passive and active influence of the EU. However, the one-size-fits-all prescriptions for regionalism in the global south should be critically reevaluated. Mercosur and other regions have to optimize their development looking for solutions to specific regional problems rather than trying to adapt textbook models of integration derived from integration experience of the EU or NAFTA. The study emphasizes the importance of non-economic factors of integration and the necessity to evaluate the success of integration associations outside Europe in the context of local social realities rather than against the EU criteria.