The field of regional integration has showed few developments regarding the comparison and the definition of criteria to evaluate cases. A frequent procedure is apply in another processes the criteria developed to the European case. As the integration model adopted in Europe is not repeated elsewhere in the world, this procedure can only lead to the same conclusions, the assessment that there are problems in the another processes, that their prospects are bad and that some cases can not even be characterized as an integration process. Therefore, it is necessary to establish criteria that can be applied universally and that assess the processes by their level of institutionalization, like it has been developed and adopted in Political Science for democratic regimes and party systems. This is an urgent task for systematic and comparative research in the field of regional integration. To face this task, the paper proposes criteria that is able to measure the institutionalization in different areas of integration and indicators for each criterion. Moreover, it does a comprehensive selection of the dimensions of analysis, in order to not privilege certain sphere or model of integration. Then, the criteria is applied to CAN, MERCOSUR, UNASUR and EU, considering the European process as one of the case studies, and not as parameter for the analysis. The results confirm this perspective, since the EU, unlike the expected, does not show the higher level of institutionalization in all the dimensions.
Regional Integration; Institutionalization; South America; Europe
