Regional Organization

Regional Organization

Regional Organizations (ROs) are in a sense, international organizations (IOs), as they incorporate international membership and encompass geopolitical entities that operationally transcend a single nation state. However, their membership is characterized by boundaries and demarcations characteristic to a defined and unique geography, such as continents, or geopolitics, such as economic blocks. They have been established to foster cooperation and political and economic integration or dialogue amongst states or entities within a restrictive geographical or geopolitical boundary. They both reflect common patterns of development and history that have been fostered since the end of World War II as well as the fragmentation inherent in globalization. Most ROs tend to work alongside well-established multilateral organizations such as the United Nations. While in many instances a regional organizations are simply referred as international organizations, in many other it makes sense to use the ROs term to stress the more limited scope of a particular membership.

Examples of ROs include the African Union (AU), European Union (EU), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the Arab League, Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).