The European Union and Latin America: A Bi-regional Strategic Alliance

Szilágyi István

doi:10.11648/j.history.20200802.11

Abstract

The European Union, as a sui generis political system, is a multi-faceted entity. It is intergovernmentality that fundamentally characterises the definition of the Union’s foreign and security policy, its ties to other parts of the world, as well as its activities to resolve international conflicts. Relations between the two regions – the European Community and Latin America with the Caribbean – have become quite intensive over the last quarter century, although dialogue between the Parlatino, the Latin-American Parliament representing the countries of the region and the European Assembly (functioning as the European Parliament from 1986) started as early as the 1960s. In the 1980s the European Parliament declared cooperation with the Third World, and especially with the South American continent, strategically important. After Spain and Portugal’s accession to the European Community this dimension took shape as an attempt to create a special joint status between the EU and the Latin American region, a tightening of economic, political, and cultural links, primarily negotiated via Spanish mediation. From the first Iberoamerican Summit, organized in 1999 in RiodeJaneiro, the strategic alliance between the European Union and Latin America has evolved in various institutional forms: bioregional summits, cooperation with the diverse subregional organizations (the Andean Community of Nations, Mercosur, Union of South American Nations) and interregional entities (Ibero-American Community of Nations), as well as diverse development programs with mutual participation. The strategic partnership between Latin American countries and the European Union is also consolidated by the common history, values, culture and political aims embraced by the partners, as well as the shared ambitions of protecting democracy and consolidating a multipolar international community. Currently, an important face to the strategic partnership is the ambition to attenuate the asymmetrical characteristics of economic relations between the partners. The intensification of bonds between the two regions also has a serious impact in the evolution of international relations.

Highlights

The European Union, as a sui generis political system, is a multi-faceted entity
Szilágyi István: The European Union and Latin America: A Bi-regional Strategic Alliance influenced by the Eastern enlargement of integration [35, 39], the Barcelona Process launched in November 1995, [41], the European Neighbourhood Policy introduced in 2003 (Communication from the Comission, 2007) and the newly restructured system of links and ties between the EU’s Mediterranean countries – among these, especially Portugal and Spain – with the Third World, primarily Latin America and the Maghreb region, which dates back half a millennium
In the 1980s the European Parliament declared the strategic importance of cooperation with the Third World, and especially the South American continent

Summary

Historical Background

The European Union, as a sui generis political system, is a multi-faceted identity. It is a macro-region linking several regions, areas, systems, and countries to the notion that is Europe, within which there are significant political, economic, social, cultural, linguistic and foreign policy tradition differences manifesting themselves in various priorities. “The present type of globalisation, leading up to the 21st century from the 20th manifests itself as a higher-level synthesis of the previous two: as a network of eternal changes and movements, a neverending and uninterrupted cycle of products and capitals” - Joaquím Aguiar argues [1]. In this era of postnational globalisation, postanational politics and foreign policy, the territorial fundaments of power are largely replaced by a web of processes, networks, currents, as well as control over cyberspace. Geographical factors, borders symbolising territoriality and the classic nation-state, ethnic and cultural and civilisational differences behind integration and disintegration tendencies, strategic cooperations representing the new regionalism of continental-integrational cooperations are all present at the same time in the network of international relations, and all are tightly linked to one another

The European Union and Latin America

Strategic Partnership on the Road of Institutionalisation

An Interregional Actor of Strategic Partnership

Findings

Summary