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This paper takes issue with the claim that European economic integration necessarily induces neoliberal outcomes. Using an approach that treats economic spaces as socio-discursive constructions, it shows that the character, meaning and personality of the ‘European economy’ continue to be contested within the EU institutions and amongst the component member state political economies. Although the analysis suggests that there is considerable space for the articulation of alternative ‘solidaristic’, ‘sustainable’ and ‘moral’ versions of the European economy within alternative conceptions of globalisation, the paper seeks to show how rationalities (technical and normative; internal and external) associated with neoliberal versions of Europe might become normalised and increasingly difficult to negotiate. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globalization is portrayed by some analysts as forcing convergence to a liberal norm, while others argue for the continued efficacy of organized market forms of capitalism, to use Peter Hall’s description, despite globalization. Has there been a general move toward liberal market structures among European economies? And are there discernable differences in economic performance that can be traced to these transformations (or lack thereof)? This paper seeks to explore these questions empirically through an examination of institutional change and economic performance in six advanced industrial economies that offer a mix of liberal and coordinated economic structures (i.e., the United States, Britain, and Ireland on the liberal side; France, Germany, and the Netherlands as coordinated economies). The convergence question is often posed strictly in economic policy terms, an unfortunate limitation given that globalization reduces states’ ability to control economic change. The key question is how the broader institutions of economic and social regulation -- society rather than government -- respond to globalization. As such this paper first produces an empirical index based on capital mobility, labor relationships, economic regulation, and social attitudes for gauging whether markets in these states have largely liberalized or remain relatively coordinated. Comparative economic performance since 1989 (marking both the fall of the Berlin Wall and the introduction of the World Wide Web) will then be examined to see if there is any correlation between political-economic responses to globalization and economic outcomes. The hypothesis is that there will be more diversity among European capitalist economies than the mainstream reading of globalization would predict, but that more coordinated economies face rising opportunity costs that will comparatively hinder economic performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the high levels of economic globalisation currently experienced around the world, it is rather surprising that there are not more instances of multilateral international monetary integration (IMI) than those of the European Monetary Union (EMU), the CFA Franc Zone and the East Caribbean Currency Unit. In fact, the only monetary union that occurred in the present era of global capital and trade is EMU. So how do we explain that EMU has not seen the creation of counterparts in North America, Latin America, Oceania or East Asia? It is this question that this paper seeks to answer, arguing that democratic peace theory and its derivatives is the most fruitful theoretical approach to explaining EMU’s exclusive occurrence in the present globalisation era. On the benefits side, it has been shown that democracies trade more with each other. Hence, we should expect democracies to draw greater benefits from IMI than non-democracies. On the costs side, countries faced with significant threats of war or political instability will want to keep control of their national currency because seigniorage is, for many governments, the only way to pay for the means to fight off external or internal threats. Since democratic peace theory argues that democracies do not wage war on each other, we can expect that they will have a lower cost of entering into an IMI arrangement than non-democracies. The same applies to (internal) political stability, whereby governments in established democracies are removed only through democratic and legitimate means. In sum, democracies wishing to form a monetary union together should face the highest benefits and lowest costs of IMI. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The harmonisation of company law on the European level constitutes an integral element of the European integration project. Along the lines of product and capital market integration, the push for European takeover regulation has been strongly advanced by the Commission to create a 'level playing field' for certain business interests. The parameters of this Directive endorse the primacy of 'shareholder value' vis-à-vis management and, consequently, various other stakeholders and advance the development of a European market for corporate control. The contested nature of the Takeover Directive, the process regarding its rejection in the European Parliament in 2001 and the follow up Directive proposals have been the subject of much academic interest, in political economy as well as in company law and economic literature. However, these discussions have so far lacked an in-depth analysis of how the Takeover Directive as part of broader European integration project implies a marketisation of the European socio-economic order. As we will argue in this paper, despite the Commission's disappointment about the compromise form, the Takeover Directive indeed serves to advance the emergence of a European market for corporate control. Although its central features have been subject to political concessions, it constitutes none the less a stepping stone towards the increased deepening and liberalisation of European capital markets and the European marketisation of corporate control. Only by setting the directive in a historical context and by mapping it within the framework of the broader project of neo-liberal market restructuring can we begin to make sense of the driving forces behind this attempt to deepen the commodification of the European political economy [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowhere is the gap between winners and losers in the Central and East European (CEE) transition more evident than in its subnational, cross-regional variation. Both globalization and economic integration in the European marketplace have strongly impacted the geographic and regional distribution of the benefits and costs of integrating markets. Declining activity rates and purchasing power in the less advanced CEE regions and rapidly increasing economic disparities across more and less advanced CEE regions place significant burdens on the future outlook of these less developed regions. Empirical evidence suggests that in CEE the real losers of European integration are low and unskilled workers with little education in declining regions. Variation in regional rates of economic growth and development is of course not news in the wider European Union. Despite evidence of increasing economic convergence across states, increasing regional disparities are a global phenomenon (Sala-I-Martin, 2002) and are likewise well recognized in the European context (Quah, 1996). The appearance of regional disparities in CEE however represents one of the greatest challenges both to the political and economic stability of CEE and to the Union as a whole. This is above all the case because the less developed regions of CEE have experienced some of the worst features of the economic transition.FDI has flowed far more strongly to CEE’s more developed regions, indirectly contributing to rising economic disparities across the more and less advanced regions. And economic decline in the CEE’s less advanced regions has thus far not been stemmed by attempts at creating regional support mechanisms. Central governments themselves are torn between investing in the less developed regions and cementing economic development at the national level (Ellison, 2007). Thus the question remains how best to promote the economic development of the less developed regions.What strategies should be employed to attract investment to and build employment in these regions remains controversial. This paper asks what can be done? Will EU structural and cohesion funds or the Lisbon Agenda help reverse these trends? Can more FDI be directed to the less developed regions of Central and Eastern Europe through other public policy tools? This paper will provide an empirical analysis of the factors influencing subnational regional economic development. Using data on the subnational regional distribution of FDI flows, this paper will ask what factors best explain the regional distribution of FDI flows and will further explore the impact of this and other variablesâ€"in particular New Economy modelsâ€"on the prospects for regional economic development. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given their economic capacity and tradition as the major providers of Overseas Development Aid, global development policy is an obvious field for much more advanced co-operation between Europe and Japan. However, while there are similar intentions and responsibilities, actual policies and preferences differ. Apart from different regional emphases, there are also different normative considerations that guide European and Japanese development assistance. Japan and Europe seem agree on a philosophy that emphasises humanitarian considerations, an appreciation of the concept of “human security”, the recognition of global interdependence, environmental conservation and potential for self-help as desirable conditions for development aid. When actual decisions on donations are made, many other considerations, among them traditional notions of regional hegemony and trade interest, seem to guide policy-makers in both regions. The paper looks at shared and differing concepts of Japanese and European development aid and asks whether better co-ordination between the poles could change the global debate on development aid. The paper has a normative agenda which is, however, rooted in a remarkably deep understanding of the practicalities of Japanese ODA. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increasing importance of the financial sector in the economy- its growing political weight and higher degree of independence of processes of financial governance from formal political developments- are frequently addressed by various theoretical strands. Even within the academic mainstream considerable concerns about the stability and functionality of the global financial system are brought up. In general, these arguments are either based on a post-Keynesian perspective or on theoretical approaches, which focus on market imperfections. From a critical political economy perspective most authors assume that the developments in the financial sector -often referred to as financialisation- are dysfunctional or speculative. Nevertheless, several scholars in this critical tradition argue that these developments are substantially functional to capitalism and imply a high degree of stability. Against the background of these diverging assessments it seems necessary to provide a more differentiated analysis of the transformation of global finance, which to us seems crucial for the development of alternative perspectives. The paper focuses on the shifting spatiality of (financial) processes of accumulation, its regulation and consequences for different economic spaces. On the theoretical level the analysis is based on a combination of the regulationist theory and a neo-Gramscian approach which both complement each other. Empirically, the paper seeks to address the central questions by dealing in particular with the EU in the context of a “minimal” US hegemony and the specific structure of interdependent economic and financial processes of accumulation. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we look at the attitudes of British business towards fixing exchange rates within Europe. Theories of political economy have suggested numerous reasons for governments to fix exchange rates. Two of the most prominent are monetary reasons - in which governments seek to achieve credibility - and 'real' reasons - in which governments are influenced by private sector interests. Jeffry Frieden has tested the efficacy of real influences on government policy choice in western Europe, finding that governments do choose to fix exchange rates to satisfy domestic interests. However, his study used general patterns of economic interaction, such as national trade balances, as proxies for private sector interests. He did not examine the economic interaction of unit level actors such as private businesses. This paper uses surveys of European business to refine the test made by Frieden. It shows that firms trading to the EU do have a preference for a fixed exchange rate (in both the European Monetary System and Euro membership), while firms not trading with the rest of the EU do not hold such preferences. In addition, firms with parent companies in other EU member states favour Euro membership. However, there are some surprises. Firms trading more widely (i.e., extra-European trade) also prefer Euro membership, despite being less dependent on intra-EU trade. Moreover, in later surveys exporting firms appear to prefer a high exchange rate, contrary to received wisdom. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proponents of globalization contend that European countries are now converging on an Anglo-American model of capitalism. Contrary to this prediction, this paper will show that in Spain globalization and EMU have promoted rather than undermined coordination among economic actors. Unable to escape from economic interdependence the Spanish economic actors have developed coordinating capacities at the macro and micro levels to address and resolve tensions between economic interdependence and political sovereignty. In this paper I show that there is at least one more variety than the two--LME and CME--that Hall and Soskice cite and also that it is possible to develop coordination capacities in countries that lack a strong tradition of such capacities. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crucial role of finance in the global political economy has long been analyzed by scholars of various theoretical strands. The discussion- often under the header of global financial governance- has focused either on the effects of global finance on th ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the role played by the idea of expansion of international society in the book "History of the Political System of Europe and Its Colonies," by Arnold Hermann Ludwig Heeren. Heeren explores a link between colonization and international political economy. His analysis suggests that it is difficult to sustain the argument that the expansion of the international society was a feature of the 19th and 20th centuries. Factors that generated change in world politics according to Heeren, across the period that he examines are discussed.

The following analysis of the current transatlantic trade dispute over genetically modified organisms and food draws on a Gramscian notion of hegemony. After discussing the conflict as structural antagonism between European and the US political economies it emphasizes the eminent role of physical risk in the formation of discursive hegemony. It demonstrates that, although the conflict derives its impulses from profound structural disparities and a multitude of social critiques, it persistently narrows down to a debate on biotechnology?s physical risks, which, in turn, becomes decisive in any kind of restrictive regulation, at national, supra- or international level. Three sources of physical risk?s discursive hegemony are proposed. 1. At the level of international regulations only physical risk counts as legitimate reason to curtail international trade with transgenic organisms and products. The reason is that these regulations either function in the context of global trade liberalisation or environmental or health protection. 2. At the level of broad publics the ?attention economy? of modern mass media tends to stage ?risk controversies? which structure not broad public perception but also the workings of responding political systems. 3. At the national regulatory level legal-constitutional principles impair the establishment of any political criteria beyond physical risk to restrict biotechnology. As consequence of the hegemony of physical risk scientific risk debates become the crucial conflict arenas. Science, however, does not conclude the conflict, solely translates it into its own contested language. A final remark considers the possibility of a rupture in discursive hegemony. Did the recent European anti-biotechnology-wave, chiefly driven by consumer concerns, usher in the emergence of a rival to physical risk?s hegemony? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Politicians, scholars and pundits alike have drawn attention to the decline of corporate and capital income taxes across multiple regions. Whether speaking of western or eastern Europe, Latin America or Asia, observers have noted that governments are relying more on low-mobility groups, like consumers and workers, to collect taxes and less on the high-mobility revenue sources, like business or capital investors. That is, in order to remain competitive in an internationally integrated economy, governments in many regions are losing a degree of policy autonomy in the allocation of the tax burden across domestic groups. To what extent does Russia’s tax regime reflect the use of the tax system to attract mobile capital investment? How does the structure of the Russian economy, which relies importantly on revenue from energy exports, alter its participation in the international economy? Does the Putin administration’s violation of property rights and its attempts to augment state control of the commanding heights of the Russian economy suggest an alternative pattern of participating in the global economy? This paper seeks to answer these questions by analyzing trends in Russian taxes over the past decade. An analysis of these trends helps us, first, to understand the extent of Russian policy autonomy under the forces of economic globalization and, second, it assists us in conceptualizing how domestic forces and economic structure mediate the powerful forces of globalization. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate (APP) was announced in July 2005 and held its inaugural ministerial meeting in January 2006. While the partnership has been dismissed as a "red herring" to distract attention from the U.S.'s failure to address climate change, its members include some of the largest emitters and fastest growing economies in the world. Thus APP-member countries account for a much larger share of global greenhouse gas emissions than the 35 countries with binding emissions reduction targets under the Kyoto Protocol.In this paper we explore - in environmental as well as in political terms - whether the APP may be seen as a supplement or an alternative to the Kyoto Protocol. We argue that separately both approaches are likely to have a low environmental impact and that environmental impact is likely to be enhanced to the extent that they can be combined. Based on an analysis of the positions of two key actors, the U.S. and the EU, we further argue that there are interesting points of convergence between the U.S. position and the Kyoto approach as well as between the EU position and the APP approach. Our analysis indicates that there is potential for more coordination between these approaches than observers as well as the parties themselves seem to acknowledge. After a decade of trying - and failing - to develop internationally coordinated climate policies that include key actors, time may have come to start focusing on the extent of cooperation that is feasible given differences in national circumstances, both among and between developed and developing countries. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When the European Council adopted the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) in 1997 it was celebrated as the main pillar of credibility of the forthcoming Economic and Monetary Union; the guarantor of the unique anti-inflatinary stance of the new European monetary policy; as the German bulwark against the "club-med" free riders of southern Europe. Just eight years later the SGP died at the hands of its father and mother, Germany and France. Yet, the euro has remained stronger than ever and the markets have not (yet?) speculated on the lack of credibility of an EMU bereft of a fiscal pact. These events point to a political economic interpretation of the making and enforcement of fiscal coordination in the eurozone. This paper presents a principal-agency analysis of the establishment and collapse of the SGP. The Pact is analyzed in the context of decisionmaking theories tracing the establishment of EU institutions to the delegation of powers of the member states (principals) to agents given a precise mandate and constrained by the constant threat of agency withdrawal. The study of the internal principal-agency dynamics will be supplemented by the consideration of the SGP in the context of the wider global political economy. The inability of the leading member states to maintain a strong fiscal stance was also a consequence of global developments, including exchange rate manipulation in Asia and financial instability in the United States. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biotechnology, as a unique technology, has become pervasive in the state-economy and world-society relations and is implicated as a knowledge-driven revolution that will change the direction or future of human life. Biotechnology’s potential for new discoveries to advance human progress through the powerful techniques of recombinant DNA is a powerful tool in the development strategies of nations. Its scientific, productive and financial aspects are sensitive to the dictates of global markets and have a transformative capacity in fostering (with integrated circuits) the next renewed expansion of the world economy. As a high and/or strategic technology (HST) it is capable of promoting growth. It is a phenomenon in possession of a dual novel characteristics ? its evolutionary capability and its unique power of replication or multiplication which, as a high intensity science and/or frontier technology (HISFT), confers on it salient agricultural and medical advantages. It is predicted that by the next twenty years a deluge of products running into trillions of dollars will be produced using rDNA technology. But the importance of science and technology in the international political economy is only meaningful or relevant within their socio-economic and political context. And in their social and political construct emerge as instruments of power and hegemony. The heuristic nature of biotechnology development is that of a structuralist dimension engendered by a world capitalist economy, of a trimodal arrangement of core, semiperiphery, and periphery countries within the international division of labor and production. This structuralist dimension and trimodal arrangement are of intrinsic causal relevance to the ontological analysis of biotechnology development, since as a highly commodified technology it introduces the concept of knowledge as property, and therefore the issues of innovation, transfer and the diffusion of techniques, products and produce become subject to national and international regimes of protection rights. And this commercialization of knowledge, in security and production structures, confers both structural and relational power, and too becomes an important determinant in the race to who becomes the next hegemon among the potential contenders, Japan, the United States, and German-led Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]