The political economy of integration

This book assesses South America's most ambitious attempt at economic integration, Mercosur. It explains the main--and inherent--weaknesses of the integration effort, through explicit comparison with the European experience with integration. The author argues that the three main reasons for Mercosur's limited success are weak domestic political institutions in the member countries, vulnerabiity in the global policial economy, and a serious imbalance in the economic and political weight of the member countries.