Explore the vast range of titles available.

In the 80's and 90's, Latin American countries instituted deregulation reforms in order to be more economically competitive. This book analyzes two key industries to gage the impact of those reforms and offer lessons for other transitional economies.

The electronic sector, in particular, the computing industry, has become an increasing concern because of the environmental impact of its products throughout their life cycle. The United States, Europe and Japan as the greatest consumers of electronic goods have given special attention to this issue. The fast computer obsolescence and its difficult confinement, because of the hazardous substances contained, have required a special effort of technical innovation. Nevertheless, this effort seems to respond mainly to the standards required by the countries in which these goods are produced, consumed and confined, which are radically different in developed and developing countries. Though an important part of the production process (assembling) is done in developing countries, little attention has been paid to the environmental quality at this production stage. This study examines the environmental problems and strategy of the electronic assembly industry in the three northern border cities of Mexico. Almost half of 200 electronic maquiladora enterprises surveyed had not undertaken any active environmental policy and there was a limited environmental standards enforcement.

As countries large and small, rich and poor are drawn inexorably into the global economy, protectionist policies are proving increasingly inefficient and ineffective for driving growth. The countries of Latin America, which have long pursued agendas of state ownership and heavy regulation of key industries, began to institute a series of reforms in the 1980s and 1990s, designed to promote competition and business creation. However, without the legal and institutional framework to support these policies (and thus guarantee resource-efficient behavior on the part of business owners), the record has been spotty at best. Competition Policies in Emerging Economies features in-depth analysis of two key industries—telecommunications and banking—in several Central American nations to shed light on the dynamics of the transition to deregulation and trade liberalization, and learn from the experiences of these economies. This book has a three-fold purpose: (1) to examine the competition conditions and policies of small developing countries of Central America (and hence cover an area where very little information exists), (2) develop an in-depth analysis of regulation and competition policies in two key industrial sectors with poor competition records (telecommunications and banking), (3) link the former results analysis with other international experiences, in order to derive research and policy recommendations that can be applied to other small, developing, and emerging economies. Featuring discussion of political, legal, economic, financial, cultural, and organization-level issues, the book provides unique perspectives on the forces resisting competitive practices and offers suggestions for overcoming them.

Given their lack of competition, market functioning in Central America2 has become a topic of growing importance and attention. In recent years competition policy has evolved rapidly throughout Latin America, and has been included in the policy agenda of governments throughout the region.3 The purpose of this text is to evaluate the means by which some Central American countries have ratified competition laws, to analyse the characteristics of those laws or of the bills that are currently the subject of congressional debate and to identify the principal problems they experience while exploring possible solutions. Some existing laws or bills in Central America were influenced by those of Mexico, a country that has been applying such legislation for more than a decade (since 1992). That precedent justifies the inclusion of an analysis of that country as a reference point for much of the research carried out in this book. This work assesses the reasons why those countries that have had such laws in place for a decade or more (Costa Rica, Panama and Mexico) have had to make changes to their competition laws in order to strengthen competition agencies. In the case of those nations that have only recently approved this legal and institutional framework, which is to say El Salvador (2004) and Honduras (2006), this study depicts the challenges they have faced in overcoming deep-seated opposition to approving such laws, as well as the extent to which they contain advances compared to their predecessors. Lastly, we point out the obstacles to approving such legislation in the two countries that have yet to adopt a competition law, Guatemala and Nicaragua. As was the case in El Salvador and Honduras, theresistance in these last two countries emerged from an optimistic view of the market’s self-regulating capabilities as well as a deep-seated opposition from within the business world. With the exception of Guatemala, however, a conviction developed throughout the region that the lack of a competition policy constitutes an insurmountable obstacle to achieving proper resource allocation and efficiency at the level of production. Within this analytical context, this chapter reflects on the experience and the most adequate competition framework for small economies and developing ones such as those of Central America. This reflection also seeks mechanisms for strengthening legal bodies that attend to competition problems, as well as the forms that help to politically value the issue of competition in a way that allows it to become a true priority in governmental agendas.