Regional Organizations, Trade Blocs, and Inter-State Conflicts in Latin America: History and Evolution

Those who have lived during the Cold War era in Latin America will naturally identify two features of the world, neither so brave nor so new, that emerged in the preface to its crisis: the debut or the return of democracy in almost all states, and the greater autonomy that the latter came to enjoy with regards to the center of the capitalist system. The social sciences soon reflected those changes, promoting certain issues to the front line of academic endeavor and relegating others to the condition of intellectual pastimes. Thus, such terms as “dependency” and “imperialism” — common language in the analysis of the continent’s structural configuration until yesterday — suggest now a remote past, neighboring the realms of archeology. One should be suspicious of so much distancing in such a short time, and ask, first, whether the pace of change has affected our capacity to perceive reality to the point that we are running away from our own shadows. This means, in regards to the subject treated here — border conflicts and inter-state wars in today’s Latin America — inquiring about the transformations that took place in the regional state system after the Cold War vis-à-vis the configuration of factors that have been responsible for the relative peace in the continent. In doing so, we should be able to identify potential threats that could upset such trends in the future.