From Lisbon to Buenos Aires ? A Consensus Strategy

The Southern Common Market emerges as an attempt to institutionalize cooperation between Brazil and Argentina that, through trade, consolidate a trust that, turn, intended to be the basis of a sustainable integration process, also covering the other countries of southern Latin American cone. Since the formal launch of the Mercosur there is a tendency to enlarge the integration agenda, which increases the complexity of the political and economic structure. parallel, increased sensitivity portions of the civil society of member states to regional nature themes, which led to increased incentives for their organization and activism. This phenomenon has brought new challenges, in addition to encouraging the emergence of a local perception of the role that the region has to play in the international system.
The increase in the socio-political involvement in the Mercosur integration process resulting from the interconnection between three dimensions: domestic, regional e global. In the first case, we can highlight the Brazilian example, which was paradigmatic in that occur in depth. In the nineties, one sees a maturing of the Brazilian productive sector, by exposure to international competitiveness (enhanced trade opening, started in Collor de Mello and consolidated in the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso), the wave privatization, the creation of regulatory agencies in strategic sectors (like electricity, oil, water and telecommunications).
At the political level is democratic consolidation, It is Fernando Henrique Cardoso the first elected president to complete his term in post-democratization was. At the same time gives a maturing of civil society and its participatory structures, com o fortalecimento de movimentos sociais – as, for example, the Landless Movement (MST) – e de organizações não governamentais, and the consolidation of the legal apparatus that regulates the so-called third sector.
In the regional dimension Mercosul, one sees in relations between member states the predominance of a more concentrated trading profile in top government ranks, the call summit diplomacy. This way of conducting matters relating to converging interests of the member states makes prevail dynamics linked more to cyclical pressures suffered by executives from each country, at the same time they are influenced by the protocol of diplomatic relations.
Largely, more than seeking to establish a good relationship between the presidents of the countries, It is necessary to seek the creation of a set of institutions and benchmarks, for a more effective internalization of standards facilitating trade integration, giving rise to the need to also be an approximation effort of internal policies. However, an approach based only on harmonization does not make sense, due to the asymmetries between countries in the region.
One solution to this problem is based on the adoption of a new method of governance by Mercosur. Drawing on the European experience, as an example has the open coordination method, which results in the adoption of some common general priorities which are then translated and adapted for each national reality. thus emerges the centrality of promoting integrated action between the government, Business, research institutions and universities, looking for intra-regional links that create competitive factors, adding value through higher innovation rates in processes, services and products.
This form of coordination between the Southern Cone countries, in its turn, It is influenced by the exhaustion of the neoliberal model of economic policy in force in the nineties. The deterioration of social indexes showed the limitations of these models, while worked as a stimulus for the emergence of participatory capacity of civil society, resuming the need to observe the economic development agenda from a broader perspective.
In this sense, in the face of the new profile of the international system, the State regains its centrality as a regulatory entity and promoter of economic and social development, responsibility that must now be shared with the productive sector. Only then will it be possible to respond to the challenge of promoting economic development with social justice, in a context guided by increased competition to which the economic system of each State and the region as a whole is exposed. Within the main ways of achieving greater competitiveness we can highlight the issue of innovation of processes and products developed.

O consenso de Buenos Aires
Em meados de Outubro, the presidents of Argentina and Brazil, in a joint statement, They presented a document called Buenos Aires Consensus, which aims to be a further step in a proactive policy to strengthen regional integration in South America, and in particular Mercosur. The values ​​defended in this document symbolize the existing political will to generate an economic development strategy with social justice, based on a conscious increase in interdependence between countries in the region.
Among other objectives, o Visa consent:
– increase the negotiating capacity of signatory countries in international fora;
– strengthen democracy in the region and guarantee the right to full citizenship, namely through regional integration and, more specifically, strengthening of Mercosur.
Among the reforms and measures proposed in the consensus to achieve these objectives, meet:
– the professionalization of public administration;
– greater transparency in decision-making;
– infrastructure development;
– a bet on science and technological development based on research in university centers and other research institutes; e
– promotion of education and health.
The mutual sympathy between Kirchner and Lula implied that Mercosur would enter a new phase, marked by the most intense effort towards the consolidation of these requirements in the same set. Yet, the priority given to Mercosur seems to respond more to issues of domestic-electoral conjuncture than properly resulting from a clarity in each member's foreign policy project. Their elections represented changes in both countries, above all the emergence of a more combative discourse on the international stage with respect to the practices of developed countries, at the same time – e dentro da mesma lógica retórica – procuravam a aproximação com outros países subdesenvolvidos.
The Buenos Aires Consensus emerges as an opportunity to overcome the domestic-electoral dynamics that until then determined the pattern of relationships among the countries of South America, and in particular Mercosur. then emerges the challenge of finding new alternatives and flexible structures and open to effective modernization of the region.

From Lisbon to Buenos Aires
Desafio semelhante se apresenta à na União Europeia, and that has been faced, since the Portuguese presidency of the first semester of 2000, with the so-called Lisbon Strategy. This is intended to be an action strategy to increase competitiveness, not only by increasing the exposure of national economies to international competition, but also through a cooperation of potentialities at the domestic and regional level. The Lisbon Strategy is translated into action plans on several fronts, through the identification of key sectors and specific objectives.
Like this, the Strategy seeks to help open a transition path for Europe to an economy based on innovation and knowledge that shapes the financial architecture, global social and political. Are, for this, structural reforms are needed in national and regional markets. In national powers, these reforms must be made in terms of bureaucracy, taxation, justice, no labor market, as well as mobility of the factors of production. The State can encourage innovation through specific incentive programs, research, tax breaks, among others.
Therefore, indirectly, the State has a great role as a promoter of regulatory power as an engine of innovation, which is a factor of increased competitiveness. The State must also practice modern and open forms in the field of public markets and public procurement, in privatizations, among others. The center of gravity of innovation are companies, this has to be done in an environment of complicity and transparency with the state and regional powers. This is the only way to generate sustained and sustained innovation processes that will actually translate into substantial competitiveness gains.
An integration project has an implicit search for influence on international power relations, as is the case with Mercosur. The objective of the current government is to transform Mercosur into an economic space for the articulation of active policies (industrial policies, agricultural, technological, establishing complementarities between sectors), go beyond the customs union. One of the most important issues that continues to prevail on the integrating agenda, and that must be overcome in order to reach this new phase, is the instability / unpredictability found in the political and economic issues of member states. The dependence of Mercosur countries on foreign capital (either because of the formation of international reserves, either because of the surplus sustainability) makes each member state's perception of Mercosur assume different profiles, depending on the situation: sometimes, when there is a certain convergence in the interests of member states, Mercosur emerges as a sustained integration plan aimed at harmony and mutual defense of the bloc's interests; when there are deep differences between members, the tendency is to ignore the instruments created by Mercosur, focusing on individualistic actions. The Buenos Aires Consensus symbolizes the recognition of the need to establish action strategies for the deepening of Mercosur. Today, Mercosur have to set the size you want to have, its economic and political dimension, synonymous with Mercosul identity under construction. solid and responsible character identity for commitments. It is necessary to avoid the risk of dilution populist nature of discussions, ideologized substantially empty and radically, on the one hand, or let yourself be overtaken by dangerously immediate priorities. It is essential to give a strategy to the Consensus.

Originally published in:

Instituto de Estudos Estratégicos Internacionais – Portugal