The main protagonists for these exogenous factors were the United States and the European Union (EU), with President George H.W. Bush's Enterprise of the Americas initiative and President Clinton's Free Trade Area of the Americas proposals being the most pronounced attempts in recent years to access Latin American markets and integrate them with the U.S. economy. On the other hand, the European Union, partially driven in its policies towards Latin America by a mix of interests representing Spanish, French and Italian investors and German and British industrialists, took initiatives favorable to regional economic integration within Latin America's [End Page 355] subregions and between these regions and the EU itself. This led to the EU's free trade agreements with Mexico (2000) and Chile (2003), attempt to conclude a free trade area with Mercosur before the end of 2004, and the pre-negotiation track pursued with the Andean Community and the Central American countries. With these exogenous factors pushing Latin America towards (extra-) regional integration, the endogenous processes already going on were often consolidated and/or strengthened. The U.S. and EU attempted through their strategies to tie Latin American countries to processes of trade integration that were taking place in their own regions, namely NAFTA for the United States (1994) and the completion of the Single Market for the European Union (1993).
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