North American integration
North American integration
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North American integration

North American integration is the process of economic and political integration in North America, largely centred on the integration of Canada, Mexico, and the United States.

While Ronald Reagan was organizing his run for the 1980 U.S. presidential election, two of his policy advisers, Richard V. Allen and Peter Hannaford, were traveling with him in Europe. They developed and proposed to him an idea regarding cooperation in North America, especially in the energy sector. A few months later, another colleague, domestic policy advisor Martin Anderson, suggested calling the proposal the "North American Accord". It would create a common market among the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Reagan saw this proposal as a solution to undocumented immigration and other problems[specify] between the U.S. and its neighbours. Despite being greeted with some scepticism and resistance from leaders in Canada and Mexico, Reagan endorsed the idea when he formally announced his candidacy in November 1979.

Reagan eventually found a sympathetic voice in Canada after a 1985 report by a Canadian government commission suggested pursuing a free trade agreement with the United States. After becoming prime minister in 1984, Brian Mulroney responded by initiating discussions with the United States and these negotiations culminated with the signing of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in 1988. This agreement served as a template for American negotiations with Mexico that were eventually expanded to include Canada in what became the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Jorge Castañeda, serving as a policy advisor to then Mexican presidential candidate Vicente Fox, was influenced by Robert Pastor's ideas on deepening integration of NAFTA and encouraged Fox to adopt these policies as part of his campaign. Before and after the election Fox made appearances on several U.S. news programs advocating greater integration including a plan to open up the U.S.–Mexico border within ten years. Around this time a number of proposals were also put forward for an expansion of the NAFTA agreement, generically called "NAFTA-Plus." After taking office, Vicente Fox proposed one such plan to President George W. Bush of the United States and Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien that would move towards a supranational union in the form of the European Union. Fox's proposal was rejected by President Bush.

The Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) was formed at a meeting of North American leaders on March 23, 2005. It was described by the leaders of Canada (Paul Martin), Mexico (Fox) and the United States (Bush), as a dialogue to provide greater cooperation on security and economic issues. A number of academics and government officials at the time viewed the SPP as moving North America towards greater integration.

In a private round-table discussion on March 15, 2006, U.S. on the Security and Prosperity Partnership Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez advocated creating a North American Competitiveness Council composed of business leaders from all three NAFTA countries in order to ensure sustainable regional integration and address issue that might impede such integration. Just over two weeks later the council was formed as an SPP working group. It has submitted several reports suggesting new measures on deepening integration of the NAFTA region including a Regulatory Cooperation Framework and a trilateral tax treaty to "provide clear rules governing tax matters affecting trade and investment between the three countries".

Several advocates of integration saw the SPP as being insufficient. One criticism was that the governments lacked a "vision of what North America might become" and as such did not provide the proper context that would allow the initiative to deal with barriers to deeper integration. Another problem seen with the dialogue was that it operated from a federal perspective at the exclusion of state, provincial, and local government involvement. The separation between the security aspect of the initiative and the economic aspect was also seen as a failing of the initiative.

The United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA) replaced NAFTA on July 1, 2020.

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