INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION------ GENERAL STUDIES FORM VI & VI

INTERNATIONAL  COOPEATION  refers to a group of actions and/or resources exchanged between actors from different countries, voluntarily and according to their own interests and strategies.

Robinson (2008) argues that international cooperation, by itself, cannot be catalogued as bad or god, because it is a type of human interaction that functions as a means to an end. In fact, the author proposes that this end is precisely what determines the value of a given act of cooperation.  In this sense, organized crime, traffic of weapons, narcotics, plants or animals can be considered actions of international cooperation with illicit ends.

When we refer to International Cooperation for Development (ICD), instead, we mean the mobilization of actions and technical, financial and/or human resources with the purpose to promote everything that can be considered as development. Nevertheless, the concept of development has many interpretations, meanings and senses that vary depending upon the perspective of the actors involved. Besides, it can be preceded by different adjectives (economic, sustainable, local, rural, endogenous, human, etc.) that contribute to the ambiguity of the concept. As a result, there is non a unique and permanent, correct or incorrect definition of ICD. On the contrary, this concept evolves and changes according to global tendencies, international priorities, social, political and economic environment and, most important, according to the notion of what is considered as development.

There is a global tendency to the diminution of traditional aid fluxes to middle income countries. The Accra Agenda for Action, established in September 2008, reinforces the importance of this group of countries in the South-South cooperation process. In this sense, Latin America is a key region, because it aggregates 32% of the middle-income countries in the world (Alonso, 2007). Therefore, it is important to have a framework of how Latin American countries define ICD, in order to understand why they conduct their actions in this field one way or another.