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IIRSA: Integration Custom-Made for International Markets By Raúl Zibechi The project for Integration of South American Regional Infrastructure (IIRSA, by its initials in Spanish), is swiftly but silently moving forward. IIRSA is the most ambitious and encompassing plan to integrate the region for international trade. If completed in full, the project would connect zones containing natural resources (natural gas, water, oil, biodiversity) with metropolitan areas, and both of these with the world's largest markets. The most disturbing prospect of IIRSA's large network of infrastructure projects is that they may well accomplish the same goals as the FTAA, only without that name, with no debate, and imposed from the top down by global markets and national elites. If this is the case, a few decades from now South America will have quietly completed a gigantic, continent-wide remodeling project that affects every one of its inhabitants. Raúl Zibechi, a member of the editorial board of the weekly Brecha de Montevideo, is a professor and researcher on social movements at the Multiversidad Franciscana de América Latina and adviser to several grassroots organizations. He is a monthly contributor to the IRC Americas Program (www.americaspolicy.org). See new IRC article online at: http://americas.irc-online.org/am/3313 -- Jim Devine / "In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy." -- Fran Lebowitz
