These past few years, the economy and international commerce have undergone profound changes. Classic, bilateral trade has developed and become more complex, making forecasting difficult. The rules of the game, the norms, are no longer national but international. Within a single company, teams have very often become multi-cultural, and their management, as a result, has drastically changed.

But it is not only the economy and international trade which are undergoing profound changes: states and nations are also subject to a considerable level of mutation. In Europe the end of the Second World War and the fall of the Berlin Wall gave rise to new situations and a new set of perspectives in relationships and exchange between states and populations. Economic perspectives changed of course, but so have social and political rules.

In 2004 the European zone was enlarged significantly, marking a return to a union of regions following over 1,500 years of divisions. Europe, in opening new economic areas has also nurtured new political and legal zones which contribute as much to driving the development of democracy, societies and social justice as they do to stimulating the economy and business. Latin America, with the NAFTA, MERCOSUR and the Free Trade Agreement between Mexico and the EU, is working towards new alliances between its populations with a view to promoting better societies which are more efficient and just, on one hand, and are in a position to exchange with other regions on the other. In Latin America, as in Europe, such changes have a direct impact on companies but it is also the new requirements of these same companies which irreversibly and irresistibly stimulate these evolutions.

In both Latin-America and Europe, Management and public relations must now more than ever take these particularities and differences into account. Research will be a critical factor in understanding and anticipating the developments to come.

The object of our assembly is therefore to examine what Europe and Latin America represent to each other within this context, as much from a perspective of their economies, public administration or legal freedom as from the perspective of those aspects affecting businesses and trade.