A Review of Chronological Developments of Economic Regionalism Ranging: from Regionalism to Non-Regionalism

Economic regionalism appears an enigmatic subject interesting many researchers though no consensus is yet built on a certain definition of it. Not only should a myriad of queries be addressed about such a subject, but one could notice an imbalance of resulted impacts between developed and undeveloped worlds. However, evidently, 2008 global financial crisis may partly unravel the mysterious nature of the subject. This article employs a mixed methods research supplemented by economic regionalism developments within the past 150 years to indicate that having been at the service of Industrial Revolution and natural economic regions, the economic regionalism has spanned four outstanding historical waves, of which the last one replaces non-regionalism with regionalism. Nonetheless, 2008 global financial crisis seemingly leads the world toward an inevitable fifth economic regionalism wave in the framework of cultural regionalism based on “good governance”.