Edward Elgar Publishing Integration and Globalization: Challenges for Developed and Developing Countries (INFER Advances in Economic Research series)

Product Description The main challenges the European Single Market is facing in the 21st century result from the enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe, the EMU, and the globalization of trade and investment that has aided the rise of competitive emerging markets. This state-of-the-art book provides fresh theoretical and empirical evidence on the challenges presented by integration and globalization for both developed and developing countries. The authors demonstrate how the European Single Market remains a work in progress with many critical issues still to be addressed. These include the rigidities in product and labor markets, the need for innovation and quality upgrading, and the rapid catch-up of new member countries. They go on to show how firms use the opportunities provided by integration and globalization to fragment their production processes internationally, which brings gains but also requires structural adjustment. The book also argues that global environmental coordination may be less detrimental to the growth prospects of developing countries than is commonly believed. Illustrating a number of methodologies, this book will be a great resource tool for postgraduates and undergraduates in the fields of international economics and business, as well as researchers and policy-makers. Review 'In some respects, intra-EU integration and globalisation move together since the Union is very open. In other respects, there are frictions such as a slowly widening wage gap between skills and the fear of continuous relocation of companies to other continents. This book highlights the interaction between these two phenomena in various ways by adding new empirical work on globalisation e.g. outsourcing, spill-overs for developing countries under climate change strategies ("carbon leakage" in EU jargon) and exchange pass-through after opening the economy to globalisation (example, India). For the EU the double challenge of absorbing the impact of globalisation and the ambitious deepening of its internal market is discussed by (rightly) focussing on EU countries most vulnerable to globalisation, i.e. the new Member States given their new production and trade structures. Altogether, a timely and useful contribution.'--Jacques Pelkmans, College of Europe, Bruges and Vlerick School of Management (Leuven & Gent), Belgium 'This is a well-researched collection by known and aspiring authors. Their mission is to describe and analyse the phenomenon of globalization with special reference to the European exemplar of this state of affairs, namely the EU. The reader will find enlightening material here on diverse aspects of the economic impact of Europeanization-globalization: students of modern international economics should find it on their reading lists.'--Michael Artis, University of Manchester, UK 'This is a collection of papers that is stimulating and rewarding to read. This book is a "must read" for graduate students, professional researches and policy-makers.'--Hamid Beladi, University of Texas, San Antonio, US 'Here is a volume that discusses the challenges of globalization and integration for both the European Union and for developing countries. Important issues like innovation, competition, integrated markets, outsourcing and exchange rate pass-through are discussed in detail. This volume will be of interest to practitioners and researchers interested in the challenges facing the global economy.'--Rick van der Ploeg, University of Oxford, UK About the Author Edited by Helena Marques, Universitat de les Illes Balears, Spain, Elias Soukiazis and Pedro Cerqueira, Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal