Introduction
In February 2020, the College of European Commissioners jointly travelled to Addis Ababa to meet with their counterparts from the African Union. It was the tenth time that this Commission-to-Commission (C2C) encounter took place already and is just one of the manifold visible manifestations of the growing importance that interregionalism plays in international relations (IR). Interregionalism is generally examined according to the intended objectives of the driving actors. Given the asymmetric character of most interregionalisms, this examination is focused on the European side of the relationship. By contrast, the other end of the interregional relationship as well as the unintended consequences and the broader impact of interregionalism on its socio-political environment are given less attention. To address these biases we seek to go beyond this predominant focus on the EU and self-given standards of success and failures, and propose a more fine-grained and contextual analysis. To this end this chapter proposes a novel framework to look at interregional interactions from the lens of unintended consequences. The framework serves as a decentring device to examine the overlooked interplays between the actors, interactions, circumstances and social structures that constitute interregionalism.
The chapter is divided into three parts. In the first part, we discuss the phenomenon of interregionalism as well as the relevant scholarship and the shortcomings related to EU-centrism and terminology, which we seek to address in this text. In the second part, we lay out the reasons why we have chosen to apply the concept of unintended consequences to study interregionalism. We consider how various literatures have identified unintended consequences in IR before unpacking this concept and its application to the field of interregionalism. In the third and last part, we introduce the individual chapters of the volume and explain how the book is structured according to three effects that interregional relations have: effects on the actors, effect on the interregional structure and broader social change.
Interregionalism: relevance and shortcomings of the scholarship
The phenomenon of interregionalism
Interregionalism regularly appears in the news. High-level summits such as the C2C are convened, trade agreements are negotiated between regional groups (Mercosur-SACU), foreign ambassadors are accredited to regional organisations (e.g. there are a dozen permanent delegations of non-members to the Association of South-East Asian Nations, ASEAN) and regional development aid represents a substantial share of the portfolio of donor agencies (i.e. 5 billion USD in 2016, cf. Stapel and Söderbaum, 2020).
Although some earlier attempts at interregionalism have been abandoned, others have emerged and evolved, putting into question previous assessments that formal interregionalism might have been a passing fad (cf. Hardacre, 2010; Camroux, 2010). In addition to the interactions between regionalism and member states as well as those between regionalism and globalisation, the interregional level is thus gaining importance. Yet in terms of theoretical and conceptual work, the scholarship on interregionalism is still developing. The study of external relations, interactions and transfers with and between region-building projects constitutes a recent but significant subfield within research on IR and global governance.
Even though there is no authoritative definition yet, in its narrowest sense interregionalism refers to the interdependence and institutionalised interactions between two distinct regionalisms, usually embodied in formal regional organisations (cf. also Mattheis and LitsegĂ„rd, 2018; Baert et al., 2014; Doidge, 2007). Several authors have expanded or nuanced this definition so as to include informal processes or actors that are not regional organisations, but which have acquired regional agency (Söderbaum, 2016; HĂ€nggi, Roloff, and RĂŒland, 2006; Gardini and Malamud, 2018).
Interregionalism in regionalism studies
The scholarship on interregionalism can be considered an offshoot or niche of regional integration studies. The precursor of interregionalism studies was the study of external relations related to particular regional projects (Kaiser, 1968). Most of the related empirical research predominantly understood Âinterregionalism â albeit without using the term â as a unidirectional matter. European Studies dominated the field since the 1970s, when the European Communities were deemed to have developed the capacity to play a role on their own in international affairs (Cosgrove-Sacks and Twitchett, 1970; Bretherton and Vogler, 2006). Much of this research related to specific external entanglements, such as Europeâs relations with the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of states or with groups of states seeking accession to the European Communities. Little research was devoted to any overarching framework of interregionalism.
In general, regionalism theory and concepts focused on intraregional dynamics and engaged less with interregionalism, with some exceptions such as the influence of external hegemons. Therefore, the scholarship of regionalism made few theoretical claims in relation to interregionalism. However, some of their concepts of regionalism can be extrapolated to apply to interregionalism (cf. Mattheis, 2014). For instance, the rapprochement of political elites (engrenage), spill-over effects or the impact of domestic politics have been suggested as factors driving regionalism and can be similarly applied to the emergence and evolution of interregionalism. However, interregionalism will invariably be of a looser nature than the underpinning regionalisms, meaning that on average, those mechanisms can be expected to be more ephemeral and less committal than regional integration dynamics.
The conceptual study of interregionalism as a global phenomenon emerged alongside the advancement of comparative regionalism, which occurred from the late 1990s onwards (HĂ€nggi et al., 2006; Doidge, 2007; Baert et al., 2014; Fawcett et al., 2015). Two considerations propelled the scholarship. The first one was of an empirical nature, as the 1990s had witnessed a proliferation of regional projects across the world, leading to many of them acquiring institutional capacities and aspiring towards some form of actorness outside of their own region. The second consideration was how to reconcile the divisions between EU studies and regionalism studies (Mattheis, 2017). Interregionalism â if understood as a global phenomenon â would go beyond the study of the EUâs external relations and take the other end of interregionalism as seriously as the EU itself, and even expand its remit to encompass interregionalism that does not include the EU at all (Lammich, 2020).
As a consequence, the bulk of scholarship focused on providing a more sophisticated understanding of interregionalism by engaging with two related research questions: how to explain the emergence and purpose of interregionalism, and how to go beyond the European case and cover the entire gamut of interregionalism.
Interregionalism as a distinct research object
Regarding the first question, scholars proposed numerous reasons to explain interregionalism, ranging from rational and realist arguments highlighting interests and power to institutionalist and constructivist arguments highlighting identities and norms (Hettne and Söderbaum, 2005; Doidge, 2011). Much of the reasoning derived its arguments from the European case and was used in connection with the growing mandate and impact of the EUâs emerging foreign policy regarding other regions.
The neofunctionalist concern with how national political elites converge towards a common way of thinking indicates that assimilation between regional elites could facilitate interregionalism. The intergovernmental argument of interest convergence among national leaders within a region goes in a similar direction and would suggest that interregionalism is largely determined by domestic (i.e. regional and national) policies. For instance, interregional trade negotiations would be a consequence of domestic industrialisation policies. Interregionalism could also serve as a means to consolidate regional power and gain legitimacy. But interregionalism cannot be reduced to a simple extension of national interests. The proliferation of the ideal of region-building across the world suggests the existence of direct connections between these projects, a hypothesis that the literature on norm diffusion has investigated (SolĂs et al., 2009; Simmons and Elkins, 2004), and it has been suggested that successful or widespread types of regionalisms would be emulated in other regions (Börzel and Risse, 2009). The research strand of diffusion has been concerned with the questions of whether and how regional models diffuse across regions (Solingen, 2012). Regionalisms would thus constitute an independent variable for other regionalisms with respect to their design (Jetschke and Lenz, 2013). The EU has constituted the central reference point in the scholarship of diffusion, as scholars have been concerned with the transfer of its institutional models and policies abroad (Risse, 2016). A different but related strand of research has been concerned with the impact of interregionalism on regionalism, for instance on regional actorness, consisting of the visibility, recognition and institutionalisation of regionalisms (Mattheis and Wunderlich, 2017; Doctor, 2007).
Regarding the second question of going global, a considerable proportion of the scholarship has revolved around the creation of a terminology with several neologisms that would allow a differentiation of the empirical manifestations under one umbrella of interregionalism. Initially, this approach was mainly used to distinguish the numerous foreign policy instruments that the EU set up â from its neighbourhood policy to the strategic partnerships with regional powers. However, it has resulted in the production of sub-categories that would also be applicable beyond the European case. A significant number of categories have been proposed, including:
- Pure or bilateral interregionalism (Hardacre and Smith, 2009), i.e. between two formal regional organisations.
- Crossregionalism (GarzĂłn and Nolte, 2017), i.e. between a regionalism and several states in another region.
- Transregionalism (Ribeiro-Hoffmann, 2016), i.e. among a heterogenous group of actors, including individual states, that belong to different regions.
- Overlapping regionalism (Panke and Stapel, 2018), i.e. between regional organisations with an overlapping territory.
- Bifurcated regionalism (Mattheis, 2017), i.e. between regional projects that belong to the same regional order.
- Stealth interregionalism (Gardini and Malamud, 2018), i.e. occurring in informal ways between two regionalisms.
- Hybrid or quasi interregionalism (Farrell, 2010; TelĂł et al., 2015), i.e. between a regional organisation and an actor representing another region, such as a regional hegemon or an ad hoc group of states.
The main concern of these efforts concerned with terminology was to distinguish interregionalism according to the main actors involved. In other words, scholars assumed that substantial differences would be uncovered from who was engaging in relations with other regionalisms or acting on behalf of a region abroad. Although in practice,...
