New Regional Orders

Why has Latin American regionalism repeatedly generated ambitious new organizations, yet struggled to produce deeper and more durable integration? And what do the evolution of the OAS, the rise and decline of post-hegemonic regionalism, and the persistence of U.S. influence tell us about the region’s political future? 🎙️ In this episode, Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Prof. Thomas Legler (Universidad...

How does water governance shape regional politics in South America? And what happens when climate change, infrastructure, mining, agriculture, and local struggles for justice all converge around shared rivers, aquifers, and borderlands? 🎙️ In the second part of a two-part conversation, Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Dr. Luis Paulo Batista da Silva (UFF), a geographer specializing in transboundary wat...

How does geography shape regional integration in South America? And what happens when shared rivers, aquifers, and environmental systems cut across the neat boundaries of nation-states? 🎙️ In the first part of a two-part conversation, Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Dr. Luis Paulo Batista da Silva (UFF), a geographer specializing in transboundary water governance, hydro-politics, and climate governanc...

What does regional integration look like when it actually works, quietly, through courts, shared rules, and constant dispute management? And how do trade negotiations, bureaucracy, and AI-driven authorship challenges reshape the legal foundations of integration in Latin America? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Álvaro Gutiérrez Bendezú, a leading Peruvian lawyer specializing in Intellectual Property...

How does a regional organization function in practice when legal deadlines collide with political realities? And why does Latin America keep producing overlapping trade blocs, without converging into one unified project? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Dr. Humberto Zuñiga Schroder (Universidad del Pacífico, Lima), an international trade lawyer and former official in the Legal Service of the General...

How do domestic reforms in Mexico spill over into regional politics? And what role does Mexico play as a bridge between North America, Latin America, and the wider world? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev continues his conversation with Dr. Octavio Gonzalez Segovia (FLACSO-México) to explore: Why Latin America develops its own models of integration instead of copying the EU Intra-regional learning and the spread...

How are flexible networks reshaping regionalism in the Americas—and what can we learn from them in times of crisis? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Dr. Octavio González Miguel Segovia (FLACSO-México) in the first of a two-part conversation to explore: The rise of transgovernmental networks (TGNs) and how they differ from traditional intergovernmental organizations Case studies like the Global Healt...

How does Mexico navigate its identity between North America, Latin America, and the Global South? And what makes Mesoamerican regionalism unique? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Dr. Alina Gamboa Combs (Universidad Anáhuac) to explore: The evolution of regional integration from Plan Puebla Panama to Proyecto Mesoamérica Overlapping initiatives such as SICA and the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor Me...

What role do small states play in shaping global politics — and how does U.S. domestic politics influence Latin America? 🎙️ Dr. Ivo Ganchev speaks with Prof. Tom Long (University of Warwick) to explore: The strategic role of small states in international affairs How U.S. domestic politics affects Latin American foreign policy The historical foundations of regionalism in the Americas Republican int...