Economic growth and economic level belong among the most monitored economic figures as they give evidence of the level of both the economic activity and performance of a country as well as of the level of the economic development at which a given state or region finds itself. Within the EU...

This paper deals with the narrowing the income gap between the Central and East European New Member States (NMS-5) and the EU-25 and with the trade-off between the real and nominal convergence. The methodology is based on international standards enabling comparisons of macroeconomic indicators,...

The economic development of the Czech Republic and Slovakia after the split of former Czechoslovakia in 1993 shows some important differences, caused by different economic policy and the starting level. The convergence of the Slovak economic level to the Czech one was very fast after the World...

A number of authors have used the concept of an optimum currency area (or OCA) index to assess the relative proximity of various pairs of economies to the ideal of an optimum currency area. Alas, a significant deficiency of this approach as used so far is that it provides no room for long-term...

As regards the frequently mentioned risks connected with the EU entry, we feel that the analyzed macroeconomic data do not confi rm that these risks have materialized. The example of the Czech Republic, which joined the EU in 2004, conversely points to an improvement of most macroeconomic...

The purpose of the study is to analyse and evaluate the position and trend of international competitiveness of the Central European EU countries, and the results of the influence of their EU membership on the competitiveness of the chosen countries. The study method is based on a complex set of...

The paper provides an introduction to essays published in this volume, which focus on nominal and real convergence in transition countries. The paper is based on the idea that the process of convergence can, to a large extent, be viewed via developments in real exchange rates. Key issues...

As a consequence of the new regionalism a marked increase in the number of regional groupings can be observed which makes the preferential relations between states even more complicated and complex. One of such complex relationships, which did not come to being during the third wave of...

Future of the European Union and its future directions should be the most important subject of the European Studies, which combine studies of Economy, Political Science, International Relations and other disciplines to study the European Integration Process in its complexity. This applies...