Monday Analysis: Morocco for the Arab World?; Cuba Hails Community of Latin American and Caribbean States

Here's a turn-up for the books: Morocco wanting to cross-over from the African Union and join the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (as this article testifies). Now, Morocco left what was then the Organisation of African Unity in 1984--and has never rejoined what is the successor to the OAU--the African Union.

Interestingly and ironically, Morocco--a non-AU country--plays host to the headquarters of an AU-recognised regional economic community we know as the Arab Maghreb Union. Can the legal brains explain to us how that works?

If Morocco does go ahead and join the Gulf Cooperation Council, as a non-AU-member, what will happen to its relations with the African Union? The article suggests though the GCC sent Morocco an invite, it would be the odd-one-out in the whole group of GCC states whose GDP out-shadows Morocco's in leaps and bounds.

The invite suggests to me that the recent murmurings about the effectiveness--or lack thereof--of the AU might have raised eyebrows in that part of the world to such an extent that they decided to do some digging of the Arab Maghreb Union--only to find that Morocco, perhaps the least disruptive member, is "available" for business.

Whatever inspired the invite, it can only cement the position and the speculation that the so-called international community wherein regional players make a difference is slowly and surely coming into shape in weird and unexpected ways!

Finally, on the Cuba, it was never going to be any surprise that Cuba would support a gargantuan community/comity of states that excludes Canada and the US. As for the extent to which it would be able to effectively marginalise the fairly invisible Organisation of American States(OAS) is anyone's guess.

With big players like Venezuela; Brazil; and Cuba in the fold, you're likely to get bombastic claims about a regional integration that subsumes UNASUR; MERCOSUR; Andean Community.

Truth be told: it's likely to happen sooner than later. The Latin Americans share a language and are in my view perhaps more radicalised in creating a common future than my counterparts over here in Africa could probably ever be!

Monday Analysis: Cameroon in CEMAC; Theories on Regional Integration and UN Regional Commissions

Since my absence for the past two weeks, I have been cogitating and ruminating over the future of regional integration. Not so much what I want to do with RegionsWatch as much as how better to make it.

Let us start with THEORIES. No concept or idea is worth its salt without a theory. So I have resolved to use at least one entry a week to look at some of the theories on regional integration out there that one can touch on. These include "neo-functionalism", attributed to American scholar Ernest B Haas, which is basically a Eurocentric view on regional integration theory that propounds the theory of "spillover" effect as one of the many elements that make up European regional integration. There are the cases of liberal intergovernmentalism--applied to the work of international organisations like the EU and the UN. Today, I came across the theory of "historical institutionalism"--a theory I definitely need to look into more closely before my head explodes!

Bottom line is that regional integration does not exist in a vacuum, and understanding the theory, in my view, is a good and sure way of ensuring that one gets a better appreciation of where this fascinating discipline of international affairs is going. Besides, I see that if I can master the theory, I stand a better chance of not being caught napping over the discipline.

Who's Daniel Bach?
Then there's DANIEL BACH, author of "The European Union's Strategic Partnership with the African Union." In my view, he makes some bombastic claims about the decision by the AU to name economic communities "regional economic communities", and wonders why the more "advanced" RECs like CEMAC, UEMOA, and SACU are not part of the UNECA-mandated eight regional organisations. As much as I see where he is going, he totally isolates the very important element of no less than the UN Regional Commission for Africa--UNECA--having conducted commendable research on regional integration for Africa in a way that some of the regional commissions have not. Neither does Bach touch on the 2006 meeting in the Gambia that "rationalised" the RECs. For a scholar of his standing, I find it self-serving and unacceptable.

Still, there's a lot of terminology I liked: "morphology of regional organisations"; "scramble for REC status": "pick and choose approach to regional economic integration"; "scramble for pre-eminence among regional groupings"...

When I am fully done with the paper, I shall be here for a review.

Quo Vadis UN Regional Commissions?
Speaking of which--I have talked about the UN Regional Commissions many a time, and I am yet to establish the very role they play in the facilitation of regional integration in places other than Africa, where it is crystal-clear UNECA has done great work in spurring debate on aspects of regional integration. Seeing as the jury remains out on where they're going in Latin America(ECLAC), Asia(UNESCAP)and Europe(UNECE)--to name but three regions--I can only promise to get back to you on them. In fact, I am particularly quizzed by the UN Economic Commission for Europe. Given how advanced the EU is in its regional integration, I cannot for the life of me see how it can facilitate EU integration processes. Like I said, jury's still out!

Hegemonic Cameroon--Not!
If Cameroon is featured here in the title, there's a reason: CAMEROON seems to suffer from hegemonic-deficiency in the sense that in the context of CEMAC, I continue to read that it is not pulling its weight in asserting itself in the way Nigeria has done so in ECOWAS, and South Africa naturally in SADC. What could be pulling it back?

I guess the jury's also out on that one! Whatever the case may be, better things are promised for RegionsWatch. To name but a few: a reader of recommended reading, the re-emergence of "BIMANORI", which is likely to come out twice a year in 2010, and four times in 2011.

I am also in the process of developing parameters/indices to "test" the "validity" of regional integration initiatives, which would include things like "imperatives" and what I call "institutional distribution".

Lost? Don't be!

It's all to enhance the experience of being a valued follower/lurker/of Regionswatch Observatory on "Critiquing-Regionalism.org"!

Incidentally, to my friends in Abuja who regularly have their page set on August 2007. I am clueless as to what is so great on that page, but thank you anyway! I do appreciate comments--helps me improve!

A "Regional Stasis" in Latin American integration?

In what is the latest bashing on Latin American integration, a piece in Taipei Times paints an-almost hopeless view of that regions efforts. The piece, penned by Augusto Varas, starts with MERCOSUR, writing that:

The Argentine academic Roberto Bouzas says MERCOSUR is in a critical state of affairs, owing to the inability of its institutions to maintain “the common objectives which drove its member states to engage in the process of regional integration and the consequent loss of focus and capacity to prioritize underlying political problems.”

Then it goes on to point out that it is BRAZIL that wants to establish itself as the hegemon--"intent on assuming a regional and global political role that corresponds to its growing economic weight."

On UNASUR, it writes:

The proposed Union of South American Nations (Unasur), like the South American Defense Council, is part of a Brazilian regional strategy to encourage cooperation within Latin America in order to counterbalance the power of the US and act as a mediator in regional disagreements. While the Unasur proposal may have been formulated in a more rigorous way than other initiatives, its failure to contemplate trade integration means that there is nothing to tie member states together beyond political will.

It ends with an quick, albeit superficial, analysis of the proposed Organisation of Latin American States I have written about before here:

What is important is what he writes:

...Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa proposed some time ago an Organization of Latin American States to replace the Organization of American States (OAS). Although the inclusion of all Latin American states goes some way toward repairing the weakened Brazilian-Mexican axis, and creates a new and more positive environment for future political coordination, this new organization is unlikely to contribute much to actual regional integration

It is generally a good read that merits more critique than I am giving it now. Suffice-to-say that the latest report by the UN Economic Commission on Africa--Assessing Regional Integration in Africa IV maintains on p.495 that:

MERCOSUR has met obstacles in consolidating its customs unions, and there are new delays and exceptions to the agreement, especially in the field of textiles and apparel. Nonetheless, MERCOSUR trade has been the most dynamic in the Latin American region, especially with respect to intra-MERCOSUR exports, which increased by almost 140.3 percent since 2004...

Although the picture is not altogether-perfect, ARIA IV does write that:

...during its 19 years of existence, MERCOSUR has proved successful in promoting regional peace and democracy. It has generated high-level political dialogue and cooperation among many domains, from justice and the fight against terrorism to the environment...

In the final analysis, I think I gave the game away when I wrote how the article reeks of dyspeptic gloom about regional integration efforts in Latin America. If he thinks this is chaotic, I wonder what he will have to say about African integration efforts!;-)

Let's face it, though--against such authoritative statistics by no less than the UN Economic Commission on Africa(UNECA), I think the writer better come again!