Two of the four macroeconomic adjustment programmes, Portugal and Ireland’s, can be considered a success in the sense that the initial expectations in terms of adjustment, both fiscal and external, were broadly fulfilled. A rebound based on exports has taken hold in these two countries, but a...

Low international competitiveness of a set of euro area countries, which have become evident by large current account deficits and rising risk premiums on government bonds, is one of the most challenging economic policy issues for Europe. We analyse the role of private restructuring and public...

This paper examines the contemporaneous relationship between the exchange rate re-gime and structural economic reforms for a sample of CEEC/CIS transition countries. We investigate empirically whether structural reforms are complements or substitutes for monetary commitment in the attempt to...

We scrutinize the role of capital flows in competitiveness in a set of seven euro-area member countries (Estonia, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia, and the Slovak Republic) in the context of real convergence and crisis. A specific focus is on Greece. The paper extends the seminal...