Economic integration and industry location in transition countries

Recent developments in international trade theory predict that increased globalization will be associated with increased locational concentration of economic activities, and hence increased specialisation of national and regional economies. Relative little empirical evidence exists on whether these predictions are correct, mainly as far as Central and Eastern Europe is concerned. This paper aims at analysing the integration-location relationship in four candidate countries during the 1990s. It demonstrates that the economic integration with the EU has changed industry re-location processes within candidate countries, bringing to a spatial organisation of manufacturing productions less inwardoriented and more evenly distributed across regions than it was at the beginning of the transition process.