In or out of Europe? What prospects for Ukraine?
Abstract The paper outlines the ambitions of, and economic and political reasons for, Ukraine to join the European Union (EU). Differences in interest and support for EU membership compared to other new EU members are discussed, including divisions among the population and elites, and the economic consequences of the enlargement for Ukraine. Public and elite in the EU are shown to be divided and lacking in support for further enlargement to include Ukraine (and Turkey). Alternatives to full membership of the EU are discussed. The European Neighbourhood Policy is considered to be the only viable alternative. This has political disadvantages, but some compensations. These include the possibilities for an independent trading policy with Russia and other parties. It has the advantage of allowing readjustment to market conditions to take place more slowly, ensuring political stability. Policy implications are that Ukraine should aim to be within Europe as part of the ENP, rather striving for EU membership which is unlikely to be conceded by the EU.
The Qualitative Shift in European Integration: Towards permanent wage pressures and a ‘Latin-Americanization’ of Europe?
US economist Hyman Minsky jokingly used to claim that there are as many varieties of capitalism as Heinz has pickles, that is 57 varieties (Minsky 1991). In this paper we argue that economic integration provides a similar analytical problem: economic integration can take many forms, and some are more conducive to wealth and freedom than others. Colonialism was probably the first form of international economic integration, and a very close form of integration at that. Intuitively we understand that what the European Union has attempted to achieve – ever since Winston Churchill called for ‘a kind of United States of Europe’ in a 1946 Zurich University speech – is something qualitatively very different from colonialism. In this paper we argue that European economic integration has made a qualitative shift from one type of economic integration to another, from a Listian symmetrical economic integration to an integrative and asymmetrical integration. We argue that this change – originating in a new definition of the nature of capitalism – is measurably threatening European welfare, first in the economic periphery and secondly potentially also in the core countries.
Diversity: Implications for Income Distribution
The expert contributors gathered here approach underdevelopment and inequality from different evolutionary perspectives. It is argued that the Schumpeterian processes of ‘creative destruction' may take the form of wealth creation in one part of the globe and wealth destruction in another. Case studies explore and analyse the successful 19th century policies that allowed Germany and the United States to catch up with the UK and these are contrasted with two other case studies exploring the deindustrialization and falling real wages in Peru and Mongolia during the 1990s. The case studies and thematic papers together explore, identify and explain the mechanisms which cause economic inequality. Some papers point to why the present form of globalization increases poverty in many Third World nations.