TY - CONF
T1 - The Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas
T2 - Dawn of an Alternative to Neo-Liberalism?
AU - Kellogg, Paul
N1 - Revised and published (2007) as “Regional Integration in Latin America: Dawn of an Alternative to Neo-Liberalism?” New Political Science (U.S.) 29 (2). June 2007: 187-210
PY - 2006/6
Y1 - 2006/6
N2 - The year 2005 was to have seen the implementation of The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), but has instead witnessed the deepening impasse of the entire FTAA process, along with most of the other institutional forms of what has been called “globalization”. In part, this impasse has involved a retreat to earlier institutions such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). But we have seen with the spate of trade disputes between Canada and the US, the fraying at the edges of even this more limited regional trade bloc. However, a new element has been introduced with the near-simultaneous announcement of plans for a South American Union (SAU – based on the Mercusor and Andean community groups of nations, plus Chile), and the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas or ALBA, proposed by Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. This paper will examine the ALBA proposal in light of the impasse of the institutions of globalization, and address the questions of a) its viability as an alternative to the FTAA and b) its compatibility with the more developed plans for the SAU. The paper builds on research presented last year at the Congress of the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences (“Canada, the ‘North American Tiger’ and the World Economy”), and to be presented at the Studies in Political Economy Conference, “Cultures of Resistance and Alternatives to Neo-Liberalism”.
AB - The year 2005 was to have seen the implementation of The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), but has instead witnessed the deepening impasse of the entire FTAA process, along with most of the other institutional forms of what has been called “globalization”. In part, this impasse has involved a retreat to earlier institutions such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). But we have seen with the spate of trade disputes between Canada and the US, the fraying at the edges of even this more limited regional trade bloc. However, a new element has been introduced with the near-simultaneous announcement of plans for a South American Union (SAU – based on the Mercusor and Andean community groups of nations, plus Chile), and the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas or ALBA, proposed by Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. This paper will examine the ALBA proposal in light of the impasse of the institutions of globalization, and address the questions of a) its viability as an alternative to the FTAA and b) its compatibility with the more developed plans for the SAU. The paper builds on research presented last year at the Congress of the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences (“Canada, the ‘North American Tiger’ and the World Economy”), and to be presented at the Studies in Political Economy Conference, “Cultures of Resistance and Alternatives to Neo-Liberalism”.
M3 - Paper
ER -