ABSTRACT
Identifying the structures and processes of the Latin American and Caribbean subsystem and tracing its evolution links the real-world region with the concepts explored in the previous chapter. This chapter delineates the subsystem in light of criteria applicable to any international regional subsystem. It also traces the subsystem's changing contours from its beginning to the present, which not only reinforces a sense of the regional international structure but also gives a sense of the subsystem's dynamism. The Latin American and Caribbean region is so internally different that it cannot be treated as a whole. This level of analysis and interaction does have considerable limitations, but in terms of the systemic criteria, the Latin American region for many years has constituted a significant unit as such in the international system. Latin America and the Caribbean is a prime example; in some respects its coherence has actually increased in the post-cold war world.
