From a pure welfare economic viewpoint, there is no contradiction between a deepening and a widening of the EU. However, the analysis in this paper shows that the factual degree of deepening efforts within the EU by far exceeds the economically optimal one. Above all, the tendency of the...

With twelve new members the decision making in the European Union via intergovernmental cooperation will become ineffective. In order to avoid a Stagno-Europe the EU has a choice: Either it looks for the very essentials in the common institutional frame or the member states agree in ceding...

The ongoing process of European integration is likely to increase trade and factor mobility thereby increasing interregional competition and affecting the interregional division of labor. From a theoretical standpoint, rising specialization and polarization of European regions may result from...

This paper extends the theory of multinational corporations, identifying three distinct influences of internal trade liberalisation by a group of countries on the level and pattern of inward foreign direct investment (FDI). First, the tariff-jumping motive encourages plant consolidation. Second,...

The global welfare implications of home market effects in trade models with imperfect competition are little understood. This paper proposes a simple model in which such implications can be easily analyzed. It shows an overall tendency of imperfectly competitive sectors to inefficiently cluster...

The present difficulties of democratic welfare states in Europe are often ascribed to economic "globalization", that is to the world-wide integration of markets for capital, goods and services which has eliminated national control over boundary-crossing economic transactions, and which therefore...