Regional integration processes: institucionality and asymmetries
ASYMMETRIES AMONG THE MERCOSUR COUNTRIES
There is growing recognition that asymmetries are an obstacle to progress in the Mercosur integration process. It is common that less developed countries have less capacity for obtaining the benefits of integration processes, with this also holding true outside of the region. For this reason, the Mercosur Structural Convergence Funds (FOCEM) were set up and a set of measures were adopted to study the situation of smaller countries.
MercoNet undertook a study on asymmetries and growth in Mercosur, generating new elements to understand this phenomena such as recommendations for policy design. MercoNet analyzed different levels of development and growth of the countries, as well as the relationship between economic integration policies and asymmetries. The regional analysis complements the studies on policies adopted by the European Union and Mercosur to address these structural differences in countries of such different size and different economies
Serie Red Mercosur Nº 12 The Mercosur countries are very different in terms of their economic size and dimension, their level of development , their population, and the size of their market. Taking into account GDP, population and territory, Uruguay and Paraguay are clearly the smaller Mercosur members and they do not represent even 5% of any of these variables, while Brazil accounts for 70%. At the same time, there are other political and regulatory differences, such as a lack of coordinated macroeconomic policies and incentive policies, in particular
Serie Red Mercosur N° 8 MercoNet was created in 1998 with the fundamental objective of strengthening and promoting the contribution of economic research to the advancement and strengthening of the integration process in Mercosur. This book, which is the eighth in the Mercosur Network Series, contributes to the consolidation and advances of the bloc on the occasion of the 15th anniversary of signing the Asuncion Treaty (1991). The book synthesizes the research contributions into three fundamental thematic areas:
Serie Red Mercosur N° 4 This publication is the result of a joint initiative of the Mercosur Economic Research Network (MercoNet) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). Ten years after signing the Asuncion Treaty, the publication is a contribution on the part of the regional academic community to Mercosur’s development and advancement
