1,721,097 research outputs found
What difference would a capital markets union make for risk-sharing in the EU?
No full textA Capital Markets Union (CMU) is the great hope of European policymakers. The plan for a CMU tries to reduce the reliance of European investors on banks and build up a market-based risk-sharing channel between member states. Our empirical analysis raises doubts that this can be achieved through the CMU as presently conceived. In line with other skeptics, we provide evidence that (i) financial flows are generally pro-cyclical; (ii) market-based risk-sharing mechanisms tend to break down for member states when they would be most needed; and (iii) even the most developed capital markets crash in a systemic financial crisis. During the Great Recession, failing market risk-sharing was replaced by the ECB through the cross-border payments system TARGET and by troika programs. We conclude that public safety nets must be robust enough to substitute for markets. The CMU is unlikely to make much difference to risk-sharing within the EU.Große Hoffnungen richten sich auf die Kapitalmarktunion (KMU) der EU. Die Pläne für eine KMU sehen vor, die Abhängigkeit europäischer Investoren von der Finanzierung durch Banken zu reduzieren und einen marktbasierten Mechanismus der Risikoteilung zwischen Mitgliedstaaten zu errichten. Unsere empirische Analyse lässt Zweifel an diesen Absichten aufkommen. Wir zeigen, wie schon andere skeptische Stimmen zuvor, dass (1) Finanzströme in der Regel prozyklisch reagieren; (2) marktbasierte Risikoteilung genau dann nicht funktioniert, wenn Mitgliedstaaten solche Mechanismen am dringlichsten benötigen; und dass (3) selbst die am weitesten entwickelten Kapitalmärkte in einer systemischen Finanzkrise zusammenbrechen. Während der großen Rezession war es die EZB, die das Versagen der Risikoteilung durch Märkte mithilfe des grenzüberschreitenden Zahlungssystems TARGET kompensierte; Troika-Programme trugen ebenfalls zur Risikoteilung bei. Unsere Schlussfolgerung lautet, dass öffentliche Versicherungsmechanismen robust genug sein müssen, um in Krisensituationen Märkte ersetzen zu können. Es ist daher unwahrscheinlich, dass durch eine KMU die Risikoteilung in der EU verbessert werden kann
The Political Economy of Social Europe: The case of inclusion policies
Full text linkEU governments have engaged in a coordinated effort to combat social exclusion. This is puzzling for empirical and theoretical reasons. The paper argues that integration of social inclusion policies can be explained by the political economy of domestic reform, driven by structural change in EU welfare states, facilitated by the new Open Method of Coordination. This explanation is contrasted with the view that European integration is motivated by EU bureaucrats’ interest in expanding their competencies and national administrations’ attempt to instrumentalise the EU for protection of their clientele
Crisis management and the sharing of catastrophic risks
No full textThis contribution was delivered on 4 May 2023 on the occasion of the hybrid 2023 edition of EUI State of the Union on 'Building Europe in times of uncertaintly'Europe may be made by crisis, but that does not mean the impact of crisis management is the same everywhere. On the contrary, the implications are often very different, depending on the wealth of national endowments, the strength of public finances, and the quality of public administration. Nowhere is this truer than in the massive efforts required for the digital and green transition coming in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. In the course of dealing with permanent crisis, the EU has developed a number of policy schemes to back up member states in their national responses. This panel will discuss whether these schemes amount to a system of reinsurance and the lessons to be drawn from its achievements and failures for even bigger challenges, such as climate change and geopolitical conflict
Good Governance in Crisis or a Good Crisis for Governance? A Comparison of the EU and the US
Full text linkThe crisis since August 2007 provides an opportunity to observe the workings of good governance institutions under an extreme stress test and in radically different political settings. Institutions such as independent central banks, fiscal rules and regulatory oversight of public finances were meant to depoliticize macroeconomic stabilization. The comparison of responses to the crisis in the United States and in the European Union shows that good governance institutions are in crisis in the US while it has been a good crisis for governance so far in the EU. Levels of fiscal stimulus and monetary easing are surprisingly similar between the EU and the US, yet the ECB has maintained its independence and member states have been restrained from inserting protectionist elements in their stimulus measures. By contrast, the boundaries between economic stabilization and distributive politics have been wiped out in the US because neither the political forces in the states nor the economic forces in the financial sector erected many defences. In the EU, the boundaries as drawn are inimical to joint stabilization efforts but this is exactly why they are politically self-enforcing
Lob der Kleinstaaterei: Rezension zu "Zwischen Globalismus und Demokratie: Politische Ökonomie im ausgehenden Neoliberalismus" von Wolfgang Streeck
Full text linkWolfgang Streeck: Zwischen Globalismus und Demokratie: Politische Ökonomie im ausgehenden Neoliberalismus. Berlin: Suhrkamp 2021. 978-3-518-42968-
The ‘Poundzone’ is just as sub-optimal a currency area as the Eurozone
No full textOne of the arguments frequently made against the euro is that the Eurozone represents a ‘non-optimal’ currency area. This derives from the notion that the variations between regions within the Eurozone are simply too large for them to share a single currency without encountering problems. Waltraud Schelkle assesses this argument by comparing the experience of the Eurozone with that of the UK during the financial crisis. She argues that the criticisms levelled at the Eurozone are equally applicable to the UK and that if diverse regions are a reason to break up the Eurozone, then the same conclusion would also have to be drawn about Britain’s currency union
Understanding new forms of European integration: a study in competing political economy explanations
No full textThis book provides a balanced introduction to diverse political economy perspectives on different aspects of European integration, demonstrating both the importance and the potential of research in this area. The volume includes three types of chapters: broad literature reviews, narrower applications of existing arguments, and new syntheses of competing claims. The authors also present a critical appraisal of how scholars in the EU and US use theory to understand European integration, and examine issues such as citizens' attitudes, perceptions and preferences of actors, the role of non-state actors, principle-agent questions, and the role and the autonomy of European institutions. This empirically informed and methodologically rigorous volume will be of great interest to students and researchers in the fields of comparative political economy, EU studies, international political economy and international organizations
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