ABSTRACT
The chapters of this book have analyzed, using different perspectives and methods, the contours of development and areas of new regional configurations within the Americas in a time of global regionalization. In doing so, this collective work has given life to a growing subregional and complex phenomenon evident in the configuration of the regional formation of South America. Accordingly, three characteristics distinguish this New South American regionalism (NSAR). Firstly, we speak of new regionalism, because it is part of the major trend of global regionalization that started after the Cold War, and it is a response to the shift of the world axis from the North Atlantic to the South Pacific since the 1980s. The second notable difference in the political–economic nature of this germinal regional configuration is political, as its focus lies in the regional reorientation of development on the basis of two paths: democratic stability, and a historical reduction of structural inequalities. The final feature is the redefinition of geopolitics, the role of social forces, and approaches to securities and national neighbors.
