As the seemingly fixed Cold War bipolar world order came under threat, weak states started to fall into conflict and ethnic rivalry. Weakened borders aggravated organized drug traffic, people-trafficking and terrorism, which impacted security dialogues throughout the world.
Regional leaders throughout the world sought for new structures in which they could manage shared interests, threats and opportunities. Marginalized economies that had been excluded from the world market, were increasingly seeing renewed opportunities in the collaboration with neighbouring countries. Different actors (like non-state actors and ideological groups) also progressively entered the vacuum that was left in global governance.
Regionalism (the collaboration of (usually) neighbouring states) since the 1990s has drastically changed compared to the Cold War regional cooperations, from being a merely security-driven organization, sponsored by nation-states, to dynamic and multidimensional integrations that deal with economy, culture, politics and social aspects. Today’s New Regionalism, a theory that has been elaborated by Hettne, is a process of construction and deconstruction by different players and changes according to the global processes. The strategic goal behind the initiatives is the establishing of a firm, coherent region that can collectively react to global pressures, tensions and challenges.