This report is one of several studies conducted by UNODC on organized crime threats around the world. These studies describe what is known about the mechanics of contraband trafficking - the what, who, how, and how much of illicit flows - and discuss their potential impact on governance and development. Their primary role is diagnostic, but they also explore the implications of these findings for policy. Publisher's note.

This study challenges several widely held assumptions about Central American economic integration, arguing that the key to understanding the failure of the integration program lies in neither advanced economic nor regional integration theory, but in the domestic politics of the states involved. Thus, the author contends that the Common Market was not the cause of the balance-of-payments and balanced-growth crises in Central America; rather, domestic political forces were the major factor in the collapse of the market and the subsequent attempts at restructuring. Professor Shaw disputes the standard interpretations of the role of the technocrats in the integration process and demonstrates that the domestic political elites played an important role throughout. He also challenges the assumption that economic integration is always a force for conciliation, pointing out that the Common Market aggravated some of the conflicts that led to war between El Salvador and Honduras in 1969. Nor are integration programs among less developed countries necessarily instruments of political and social change, according to this analysis; on the contrary, political elites used the Common Market to bypass the internal economic reforms necessary for national development. This study incorporates new material—interview data and other primary source material—on events of the past eight years.

This powerful reworking of the liberal tradition of international law uses Grotius as the vehicle for understanding coming challenges to the global commons. Fundamental problems of scarcity, sovereignty, anachronistic thinking, and territorial temptation are interwoven in historical and contemporary contexts to illuminate the tendency among states to share resources, but only when necessary.