ABSTRACT
In the North–South integration process, Europe is to the Maghreb as the United States is to Mexico. The openness of markets in the North to products from the South could provide the South with benefits of increasing returns, thus broadening the scope for technological change and enhancing the ‘catching up’ process. The similarities and differences between the positions of the Maghreb and Mexico are discussed and questions are raised as to whether the positive features of the Mexican experience in technology development could be replicated in the Maghreb. The article concludes that the Maghrebian economies could learn from the Mexican maquiladora experience in their effort to integrate with the European Union with respect to transnational commodity chains.
