Since the beginning of US President Donald Trump’s second term, the already volatile international order has faced increasingly disruptive developments and fundamental challenges. This volume outlines and analyses the role of Latin America as a whole, and of individual countries including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico, in the new global (dis)order.

The book is divided into three parts. The first contains contributions on regional dynamics in Latin America: What do global developments mean for Latin America’s development options? What are the consequences for Latin American regionalism? Why have regional democracy clauses repeatedly proved ineffective? The second part examines the role of external actors in Latin America: the USA, China, the European Union and Russia. The third section analyses the foreign policies of single states and asks what role concepts such as ‘active non-alliance’ and ‘feminist foreign policy’ play for Latin America. In their concluding remarks, the editors analyse the potential consequences of Trump’s policies for the topics covered in the volume after the first 100 days of his Administration.

The volume provides an up-to-date, theory-based examination of key issues in Latin American international relations and is essential reading for scholars, students, policymakers and others interested in Latin American international relations.

Peter Birle holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Mainz (1995). Since 2001, he has headed the research department of the Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut, Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz in Berlin and taught at Freie Universität Berlin. From April to September 2023, he was the German Director in Presence of the international joint project Mecila (Maria Sibylla Merian International Centre for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences Conviviality-Inequality in Latin America) based in São Paulo, Brazil.

Claudia Zilla is a Senior Fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), Berlin, which she joined in 2005. From 2012 to 2019 she headed the SWP’s research division The Americas. In 2014/2015 she was a Fritz Thyssen Fellow at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. In 2002/2003 she coordinated the postgraduate programme ‘European Political Studies’ at the Heidelberg Centre for Latin America of the University of Heidelberg in Santiago de Chile. She holds a PhD in political science from the University of Heidelberg.