Is Latin America an Optimum Currency Area? Evidence from a Structural Vector Autoregression Analysis

2012 ◽  
pp. 43-68
Author(s):  
Foresti Pasquale

This paper evaluates the advisability of a monetary union in Latin America applying the theory of optimum currency areas (OCA). The analysis is based on the traditional OCA criteria and it suggests that there is no evidence for any monetary integration in Latin America even at a sub-regional level. Latin American countries have evidenced a low degree of trade integration and asymmetric co-movements among their shocks. Moreover, substantial differences in the speed of adjustment and in the size of shocks are found. Hence, higher policy coordination seems to be necessary before starting any economic integration process in Latin America.

2008 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-308
Author(s):  
Jean-Pierre Allegret ◽  
Alain Sand-Zantman

This paper assesses the monetary consequences of the Latin-American integration process. Over the period 1991-2007, we analyze a sample of five Latin-American countries focusing on the feasibility of a monetary union between L.A. economies. To this end, we study the issue of business cycle synchronization with the occurrence of common shocks. First, we assess the international disturbances influence on the domestic business cycles. Second, we analyze the impact of the adoption of different exchange rate regimes on the countries' responses to shocks. .


1995 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafael Roncagliolo

Abstract: Over the last few years, academic discussions about the state of communications in the Americas, particularly those discussions taking place in the northern part of the continent, sometimes slide into one or more of the following misunderstandings: the provincialist view, which considers the entire hemisphere to be involved in a single process of trade liberalization, like the NAFTA; the overly simplified view, which assumes that the southern countries are a homogeneous group, from the point of view of cultural and technical vistas; the belief that there has been no effort to integrate these countries' communications; and the globalist view, which aims at forgetting the profound peculiarities which radically differentiate American communications from those of the rest of the world. Keeping in mind these traps and dangers, in this presentation I would like to specify that there exist not one but many processes of trade liberalization affecting the Americas; introduce a view of the internal complexity and heterogeneity of the region; enumerate prior Latin American attempts at communications integration, looking at materials and goals; and present three peculiarities which differentiate the region from the rest of the world. Résumé: Depuis quelques années, les discussions académiques sur les communications dans les Amériques, particulièrement celles ayant lieu dans la moitié nord de ces continents, s'empêtrent parfois dans un ou plusieurs des quatre malentendus suivants: la perspective "provincialiste", qui croit que l'hémisphère entier est en train de s'engager dans un seul grand processus de libéralisation d'échange, à l'instar de l'Accord de libre-échange nord-américain; la perspective simpliste à l'excès, qui suppose que les pays du Sud sont homogènes, tant du point de vue culturel que technique; la croyance qu'il n'y a eu aucun effort d'associer les communications dans ces divers pays; et la perspective "globalisante", qui oublie les particularités profondes qui rendent les communications nord- et sud-américaines radicalement différentes de celles du reste du monde. Tenant compte de ces pièges et dangers, nous aimerions dans cet article spécifier qu'il n'existe pas qu'un seul processus de libéralisation d'échange touchant les Amériques, mais bien plusieurs; souligner la complexité interne et l'hétérogénéité de la région; décrire des tentatives antérieures en Amérique latine d'intégrer les communications, en se concentrant sur matériaux et objectifs; et présenter quelques unes des caractéristiques qui distinguent cette région du reste du monde.


Author(s):  
Xu Wenhong

Latin American countries were not a part of the earlier draft of the route map of China’s Belt and Road initiative. Through efforts of both sides, starting from the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation in May 2017, Latin America has become an indispensable and important participant of the ‘Belt and Road’ initiative. In view of the differences in history and objective circumstances between China and Latin America in terms of histories, cultures, current economic states and development needs etc., policy coordination plays a fundamental role in the China-Latin America cooperation under the framework of the Belt and Road initiative. This article explores the four aspects of policy coordination in the BRI context, namely historical background, philosophy, principle and objective. The article notes that the weight of the US, EU and Japan in the global economy is decreasing, and the number of contradictions in the national economies of these countries, on the contrary, is growing. At the same time, the aggregate economic weight of developing countries is increasing. This new paradigm of development of the world economy gives a chance to developing countries, namely China and Latin America, to deepen economic cooperation. China has already become the second largest trading partner and the third largest source of investment for Latin American countries. China also proposes a solution based on its own Chinese experience, which will allow countries from Latin America to further accelerate their economic growth through infrastructure cooperation within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative. The basic principles of such cooperation are win-win cooperation, shared growth through discussion and collaboration and the essence of policy coordination, etc. It is believed that, on the premise of a high degree of consensus achieved through policy coordination, both China and Latin America will achieve sustainable and efficient cooperation and development under the framework of the Belt and Road initiative.


2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Juliana Gonzalez Jauregui

PurposeAccording to official statements, BRI is a Chinese call for global cooperation, based on five priorities: policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration and people-to-people bonds. The purpose of this paper is, primarily, to describe and contextualize the official discourse of China's foreign policy toward Latin America, emphasizing on BRI. On that basis, the author aims to contrast official rhetoric with real facts, bringing problematic cases associated with implementing BRI in Asian and African developing countries, so as to discuss possible challenges that Latin America can encounter when implementing the initiative. Finally, the author evaluates potential implications of resembling the Chinese three-level scheme of development in the region and make suggestions on this subject.Design/methodology/approachIn an effort to evaluate possible implications of BRI in Latin America, the paper describes and contextualizes Chinese foreign policy official rhetoric toward the region's countries. Based on that, the author brings to discussion Asian and African experiences in the implementation of the initiative and raise questions on controversial issues that Latin America could meet when enforcing BRI-related projects.FindingsAs a part of its new foreign and economic policies, China continues to strengthen its engagement with Latin American countries, enlarging its strategy though the promotion of BRI. If Latin American countries, through BRI, seek to replicate the Chinese three-level of development scheme, including domestic, regional and global scopes, certain controversial issues cannot be ignored in the design and implementation processes. Also, equal participation of Chinese and Latin American governments, societies and enterprises is decisive if the goal is to settle a long-term development scenario for the region.Originality/valueThe central thesis of this paper is that the implementation of BRI in Latin American countries could potentially replicate the Chinese three-level development proposal. To achieve such an ambitious goal, much depends on how Latin American countries define and enforce BRI projects. Full understanding of those challenges requires close attention to what the Chinese official rhetoric claims and what actually puts into practice in other developing countries already involved in BRI, so as to anticipate possible consequences for the region.


2005 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-222
Author(s):  
Kalbe Abbas

Monetary Policy plays a crucial role in macroeconomic stabilisation of a country. Latin American countries have faced successive waves of economic instability causing hyper-inflation and currency and financial crises leading to losses in output. This book is a collection of papers presented at the conference on “Monetary Policy and Macroeconomic Stabilization in Latin America”, held at the Kiel Institute for World Economics (IFW), in Kiel, Germany, on September 11-12, 2003. Well-known speakers from major multilateral policy institutions and the monetary authorities of Latin American economies participated in this conference. Graphs and tables throughout the book make for easy understanding of the main findings, as the book focuses on the recent experience of Latin American economies with designing, announcing, and implementing monetary policies with different internal and external anchors. It deals with the exposure of real exogenous shocks, high dollarisation, regulated and segmented labour market, inappropriate policies and monetary institutions, and unrest from deep financial and currency crises. The book draws lessons from European monetary integration for Latin America, and examines the role of financial integration to help reduce the systematic shocks in Latin America.


2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agustín Escobar Latapi

Although the migration – development nexus is widely recognized as a complex one, it is generally thought that there is a relationship between poverty and emigration, and that remittances lessen inequality. On the basis of Latin American and Mexican data, this chapter intends to show that for Mexico, the exchange of migrants for remittances is among the lowest in Latin America, that extreme poor Mexicans don't migrate although the moderately poor do, that remittances have a small, non-significant impact on the most widely used inequality index of all households and a very large one on the inequality index of remittance-receiving households, and finally that, to Mexican households, the opportunity cost of international migration is higher than remittance income. In summary, there is a relationship between poverty and migration (and vice versa), but this relationship is far from linear, and in some respects may be a perverse one for Mexico and for Mexican households.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-120
Author(s):  
Yousef M. Aljamal ◽  
Philipp O. Amour

There are some 700,000 Latin Americans of Palestinian origin, living in fourteen countries of South America. In particular, Palestinian diaspora communities have a considerable presence in Chile, Honduras, and El Salvador. Many members of these communities belong to the professional middle classes, a situation which enables them to play a prominent role in the political and economic life of their countries. The article explores the evolving attitudes of Latin American Palestinians towards the issue of Palestinian statehood. It shows the growing involvement of these communities in Palestinian affairs and their contribution in recent years towards the wide recognition of Palestinian rights — including the right to self-determination and statehood — in Latin America. But the political views of members of these communities also differ considerably about the form and substance of a Palestinian statehood and on the issue of a two-states versus one-state solution.


Author(s):  
Amy C. Offner

In the years after 1945, a flood of U.S. advisors swept into Latin America with dreams of building a new economic order and lifting the Third World out of poverty. These businessmen, economists, community workers, and architects went south with the gospel of the New Deal on their lips, but Latin American realities soon revealed unexpected possibilities within the New Deal itself. In Colombia, Latin Americans and U.S. advisors ended up decentralizing the state, privatizing public functions, and launching austere social welfare programs. By the 1960s, they had remade the country's housing projects, river valleys, and universities. They had also generated new lessons for the United States itself. When the Johnson administration launched the War on Poverty, U.S. social movements, business associations, and government agencies all promised to repatriate the lessons of development, and they did so by multiplying the uses of austerity and for-profit contracting within their own welfare state. A decade later, ascendant right-wing movements seeking to dismantle the midcentury state did not need to reach for entirely new ideas: they redeployed policies already at hand. This book brings readers to Colombia and back, showing the entanglement of American societies and the contradictory promises of midcentury statebuilding. The untold story of how the road from the New Deal to the Great Society ran through Latin America, the book also offers a surprising new account of the origins of neoliberalism.


1969 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 157-169
Author(s):  
Andrés Dapuez

Latin American cash transfer programs have been implemented aiming at particular anticipatory scenarios. Given that the fulfillment of cash transfer objectives can be calculated neither empirically nor rationally a priori, I analyse these programs in this article using the concept of an “imaginary future.” I posit that cash transfer implementers in Latin America have entertained three main fictional expectations: social pacification in the short term, market inclusion in the long term, and the construction of a more distributive society in the very long term. I classify and date these developing expectations into three waves of conditional cash transfers implementation.


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