Costa Rica and the Central American integration project under a critical lens: tensions, miscalculations and democratic regression in multipolarity.

Abstract

The process of Central American integration seeks to balance development, democracy and peace, but a gap remains between economic cooperation and the political and jurisdictional articulation.

The institutional architecture shows overlapping functions and weak coordination, which limits the efficacy and erodes the social legitimacy of the project. Even still, benefits in intraregional and interregional commerce, technical cooperation and political dialogue can be observed, which justifies keeping and boosting integration under efficiency criteria, accountability and citizen participation, especially in the face of democratic setbacks and international challenges. These tensions are located in a multipolar international setting, where the distribution of power and strategic volatility increase the costs of unilateral action for small and medium-sized countries. In this context, integration is not only desirable, but necessary, as a strategy for integration and resilience, as it guarantees joint bargaining power and coordination in the face of external shocks. 

The paradox of Costa Rican integration, with its pragmatic economic interests and distance from political and judicial bodies of integration, illustrates the dilemma between internal autonomy and regional influence, and highlights many of the problems with the integration process in general. Finally, the argument is made for operationalizing integration in terms of cooperative security through the formation of a regional defense bloc linked to the SICA, as a tool for negotiation and deterrence in the face of external pressures, and to avoid the recurrence of cycles of instability.