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The article is a reaction to the European Commission's White Paper on the EU's future released on 1 March 2017. It presents and reviews the fundamental scenarios of next evolution of the Union involved in the Paper. The following five scenarios - "Carrying on", "Nothing but the single market", "Those who want more do more", "Doing less more efficiently" and "Doing much more together" - are appreciated. The scenarios shall create a frame and routing of debates on the EU's future by 2025. Attention is also dedicated to some weaknesses and deficiencies of the White Paper, and to some other reflections and aspects of the next EU27. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The possibility of the UK's withdrawal from the European Union has never been more realistic and upto- date since joining the European Communities (EC) as it is today. The UK is facing a unique situation. At present, this depends solely on the capabilities of European and British government officials, who negotiate the terms of withdrawal and future cooperation between the two entities. The main goal of this paper is based on the British - Slovak trade relations development analysis to figure out their impact within the Brexit consequences on the future Slovak economy and its current status in international economic relations. The paper also provides a basic overview of Brexit process and its possible impact on the EU's further functioning. Basic data will be drawn from generally accepted institutions, evaluating the UK and Slovak trade and economic performance. To accomplish this goal, methods such as analysis and comparison to illustrate the UK-Slovak foreign trade development, synthesis and logical deduction to discuss the Brexit impact on Slovak economic environment in the future are to be used; data from scientific and professional publications, periodical and non-periodical press. The paper presents the results of an empirical analysis, which showed that because of the size of economic relations between Slovakia and the United Kingdom and the number of goods and services being exported to the UK, the «hard» Brexit will be very unfavourable for Slovak foreign trade due to the possible tariffs being imposed. The research empirically confirms and theoretically proves that it can cause a significant weakening and slowdown in the Slovak economy. Either way, the upcoming Brexit process, that is the withdrawal of Great Britain from the European Union, would have a major impact not only on British, European but also on the world economy. The impact of Brexit on Slovakia's economy will not only be in reducing the possible growth of the economy, but also in employment and price increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UK's automotive industry has been one of the ‘star performers’ of the UK economy in recent years – unlike most other manufacturing sectors. Output has increased by over 60 per cent since 2010 and there has been over £8 billion worth of investment in the industry in the past five years. The industry supports some 800,000 jobs in the UK. It is seen as having benefitted from EU membership. So what might Brexit mean for the UK automotive sector, and its workers? This paper considers short-run impacts, before turning to the impact of uncertainty on foreign direct investment inflows and then the nature of a possible trading relationship. Some brief reflections on policy implications round off the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the dynamics of trade at EU level, using panel data for the 28 Member States (MS). The relationship between GDP, population level, imports and exports for the period 2010-2017 is analyzed. Afterwords we move to a particular case, namely the United Kingdom using data series for the period 2008 - 2017and the same variables as above. In this case, the relationship between GDP, exports and population level will be analyzed. In both cases, the data source is Eurostat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Innovation is an integral part of economic development in developed economies. In the post 2008 period, a key policy agenda is that of sustainable development, which calls for innovation in all aspects of value-chains. In this paper, we focus on innovation from the biotech-pharma perspective to see whether or not this will lead to a sustainable future for the regions where there are clusters of firms in this sector. We examine data from a recently completed European Union study of innovation in the Healthcare sector from the UK and Switzerland, countries with an historical base in pharma, to understand how innovation pathways vary at the regional level in the broader life sciences, which incorporate biotech and more. Innovation in the healthcare sector in two regions, Oxfordshire in the UK and Zurich in Switzerland are compared. We contextualize our discussion by drawing on studies that focus on the sector in the US, specifically Boston. The analytical framework comprises three elements: innovation systems and national and regional economic development theories are the first two, followed by approaches which consider organizational or institutional activity. This framework is used to help explain and understand the complexity of how innovation is organized at the sub-national level. The overall context is that it is increasing becoming a condition for government financing of research that it has more immediate application in industry or have the possibility of commercialisation (e.g., translational research). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After the United Kingdom has left the European Union it remains unclear whether the two parties can successfully negotiate and sign a trade agreement within the transition period. Ongoing negotiations, practical obstacles and resulting uncertainties make it highly unlikely that economic actors would be fully prepared to a "no-trade-deal" situation. Here we provide an economic shock simulation of the immediate aftermath of such a post-Brexit no-trade-deal scenario by computing the time evolution of more than 1.8 million interactions between more than 6,600 economic actors in the global trade network. We find an abrupt decline in the number of goods produced in the UK and the EU. This sudden output reduction is caused by drops in demand as customers on the respective other side of the Channel incorporate the new trade restriction into their decision-making. As a response, producers reduce prices in order to stimulate demand elsewhere. In the short term consumers benefit from lower prices but production value decreases with potentially severe socio-economic consequences in the longer term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the issues faced by the EU in developing its international roles post-Brexit, using a combination of discursive analysis and role theory to investigate the development and performance of roles in a number of linked arenas. Central to this analysis is the assumption that whatever form Brexit takes, the EU and the UK will remain closely entangled, and thus that the post-Brexit role assumed by the UK will shape the evolution of EU external action. But a key task for analysis is to place the impact of Brexit into the array of wider forces affecting EU external action, and this is a key aim of the article. The article begins by exploring the discourses of globalism characteristic of UK and EU foreign policies, as focused by the debates about 'global Britain' and EU global strategy since 2015. It then introduces a simple framework for considering the roles conceived and performed by the EU, and their potential impact in the post-Brexit world. The article then considers three areas of EU external action, and the ways in which they might be shaped by a post-Brexit world: trade and development, transatlantic relations and security and defence policy. The conclusion discusses the implications of the cases, especially in relation to the conversion of discursive role constructs into performable roles--a problem central to EU external action--and concludes that whilst the impact of Brexit will be significant, it is likely to be less fundamental than the impact of the challenges faced by the EU in the global arena more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the potential decrease of the economy in the Euro Area. It highlights the shrinking of the economy in Euro Area by 1.6 percent on quarterly basis. It noted the decrease of economic activity in the first quarter of 2009. It emphasizes that the forecast on the decline of economy came from both public and private sectors. The article also presents various charts and diagrams depicting the economic activity in the Euro Area including the contribution of stockbuilding to the growth of gross domestic product (GPD), inflation expectation and the prospects for the European Union.