The Andean Common Market's Common Regime for Foreign Investment

The Andean Group (ACM) was organized as a subregion of the Latin American Free Trade Association under the Agreement of Cartagena in 1969. This article analyzes its provisions and effects. It concludes that the ACM's Common Regime of Treatment of Foreign Capital seems to be a well-balanced set of rules representing an ambitious attempt at reconciling national and regional development interests with the need for foreign capital and technology on terms equitable and remunerative to those who supply them. It is not perfect on the one hand, but on the other hand it is almost certainly not so bad as some United States business interests would paint it. The Common Regime, however, is, more than perhaps anything else, an invitation to all the participants in the ACM economies to reason together and forge a mutually beneficial way forward built on disclosure and common concern