The security of Mercosur?

This paper attempts to initiate the discussion by exploring to which extent it is possible to talk about security governance in Mercosur—the Common Market of the South created in 1991 by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.For the discussion of security governance in the Southern Cone, this paper distinguishes between three types of security issues that have been the subject of regional security policy coordination. Firstly, when Mercosur was an integration project and prior to its foundation, leaders opted for a broad definition of security that encompassed the success of the democratic transitions and domestic civil-military relations, as well as insertion in the world economy. A second set of security issues is formed by more traditional threats, which indeed have long been part of the Latin American security agenda. These are the issues associated with the use or threat of violence and military force, territorial integrity and sovereignty, and questions of armaments, balances of power and nuclear development. Finally, especially since 9-11 but also before then, a new set of issues have been incorporated into the regional security agenda. Among these are the so-called new threats to security, which include 'transnationalised' domestic threats such as drugs traffic, illegal traffic of weapons, criminal networks with transnational connections, environmental issues, and others. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]