In March of 1991 the Argentine Carlos Menem, the Brazilian Fernando Collor de Mello, the Paraguayan Andrés Rodríguez and the Uruguayan Luis Alberto Lacalle Herrera signed the Treaty of Asunción, the document that served as the basis for the establishment of the Common Market of the South (Mercosur). In a first phase, the initiative, made up of large and medium-sized economies, was motivated by the effort to consolidate a South Americ...