Number of results to display per page
Search Results
12. CPLP: the first twenty-five years
- Author:
- Joseph Marques
- Publication Date:
- 07-2022
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Institution:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Abstract:
- The decision by Conjuntura Austral to dedicate a special issue to the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP) is to be commended. The uniqueness of the organization justifies a timely review of a small sample of its activities to date. Created in 1996, the CPLP adopted three main vectors of activity:1) the promotion and dissemination of the Portuguese language; 2) cooperation in a wide array of domains (i.e., education, health, science and technology, defense, agriculture, public administration, communication, justice, public safety, culture, sport and social communication, sustainable development, etc.); and 3) political and diplomatic coordination, especially in multilateral forums. The organization also agreed to adhere to several fundamental political principles such as the respect of the sovereignty of each member country; non-interference in domestic issues; reciprocal treatment; peace, democracy, rule of law, human rights, and social justice; territorial integrity of each member state; and the commitment to the promotion of development and cooperation. In addition to a common language and shared cultural heritage, the uniqueness of the CPLP results from the union of nine non-contiguous member states into a privileged geocultural space – the lusosphere – dedicated to the active promotion of its three main goals across four continents. It is a privileged forum for a “pluricontinental dialogue” in Portuguese. In addition, each country contributes by bringing its history, its unique interpretation of the “lusosphere” as well as its regional context (i.e., membership in the European Union, Mercosur, Southern African Development Community, Economic Community of West African States, etc.) as well as economic opportunities to the group. By joining, member countries reinforce the group’s collective projection onto the world stage as well as the opportunity to expand each member country’s diplomatic footprint. While each member had different reasons to join (i.e., maximize politicaldiplomatic cooperation, language promotion, widen access to technical cooperation, etc.), all believe that the CPLP can bolster the group’s overall political and diplomatic prestige while enhancing their collective and individual prospects. This special issue consists of six articles ranging from language to health, security and defense issues, business negotiations and civilian-military relations. It covers but a few topics from a long list of issues which, after the first twentyfive years of this new international organization, warrant the attention and critical review of academic scholars.
- Topic:
- Security, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Diplomacy, Health, Business, Language, Indigenous, and Civil-Military Relations
- Political Geography:
- Africa, Europe, Brazil, South America, Southeast Asia, and Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP)
13. Cooperation against the odds: Getting small firms to work together in unfavourable circumstances
- Author:
- Kira Gartzou-Katsouyanni
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP)
- Abstract:
- How can we get small firms to work together in order to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes, despite adverse circumstances? This policy paper provides an answer to this question that could be useful both to policymakers and to local stakeholders seeking to undertake innovative, cooperative economic activities in their area. Based on evidence from eight case studies within the Greek agri-food and tourism sectors, I argue that a small group of local actors, whom I call ‘institutional entrepreneurs’, usually play a key role in catalysing the emergence of cooperation at the local level. Their strategies and experiences carry valuable insights. I also outline the characteristics that macro-level institutional frameworks need to have if they are to facilitate local cooperation. These characteristics can inform the design of institutions at both the domestic and the EU level. The paper’s findings could be relevant to people interested in local development, but also to those concerned with boosting the productivity and export orientation of the Greek economy as a whole. After all, cooperation can improve the performance of small firms, and it is thus an important ingredient for inclusive growth in countries with a lot of small firms, such as Greece.
- Topic:
- Development, Economy, Business, and Production
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Greece
14. How Its War on Ukraine Killed Russia’s Hydrogen Ambitions
- Author:
- Aliaksei Patonia
- Publication Date:
- 10-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS)
- Abstract:
- Hydrogen looks like the fuel that can facilitate global decarbonization because it can be used in diverse applications—such as heat and power generation, transport, and manufacturing—without any carbon emissions. But, while many countries (including in Europe) view renewables-based, zero-carbon hydrogen as the ultimate goal in transitioning to a hydrogen economy, today most hydrogen is produced from natural gas. Thus, it is unlikely that the hydrogen transition will happen without relying on this fossil fuel. Russia is the country with the world’s largest natural gas deposits, and it has been exploring ways to adjust its energy sector to the needs of the emerging global hydrogen one. In 2021, it announced the goal of capturing up to 20 percent of the world’s hydrogen market by 2030. This came after all the major importers of Russia’s energy products had developed their hydrogen strategies, and its key energy companies started to explore new opportunities. Having signed memoranda of understanding with some of the world’s major energy companies to jointly develop Russia’s hydrogen export potential, they focused on Europe as the key destination. Some of Asia’s hydrogen pioneers and most promising future importers, such as Japan and South Korea, were also included among Russia’s potential partners. These steps could have resulted in long-lasting and fruitful collaborations generating large profits for Russia, but its ambitions have been jeopardized by its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This has led to Russia losing key political and economic partners in Europe and also in Asia, which—in combination with being the target the toughest sanctions in its history—is likely to cripple its nascent hydrogen sector. Having planned to convert its natural-gas pipelines to transport hydrogen to future buyers in Europe, Russia is unlikely to be able to use this infrastructure for this purpose anymore. The EU will be an unlikely buyer of Russian hydrogen for the foreseeable future. Turning to Japan and South Korea would not be a success either, since they have joined the sanctions regime against Russia and, like the EU, have been officially labeled as unfriendly by Moscow. This will make the transfer of the technologies critical for the production of low- and zero-carbon hydrogen from the world leaders to a technologically backward Russia very problematic. Europe will also feel long-lasting repercussions of Russia’s war in Ukraine in the energy and hydrogen sectors. With no steady supplies of cheap Russian gas or hydrogen, Europe’s decarbonization efforts and building up its hydrogen industry will be inhibited and require a lot more effort and money. Russia will have to seek alternative markets for its energy commodities and it will seek deals with China, the only country whose energy consumption can rival that of Europe. But, as one of the world’s largest producers of electrolysers and of conventionally manufactured hydrogen, China probably will not need to import Russia’s hydrogen to build up its own hydrogen sector. Possessing critical technologies of its own, it will instead increase imports of Russian primary energy sources (such as natural gas) that it can use for producing hydrogen. The influx of huge volumes of cheap Russian feedstock will speed up China’s transformation from a country with a nascent hydrogen sector into a dominant player on the global hydrogen market. If the EU or the United States—the only two actors comparable to China in economic, technological, and geopolitical strength—do not develop similarly strong hydrogen sectors, Beijing could end up dominating the global energy landscape. To avoid the geopolitical consequences of this and for global balance to be maintained, further cooperation between the EU and the United States will be needed to speed up the creation of strong hydrogen sectors for both.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Economics, Business, Trade, Hydrogen, and Russia-Ukraine War
- Political Geography:
- Russia, Europe, and Ukraine
15. A Compass to Guide EU Policy in Support of Business Competitiveness
- Author:
- Fredrik Erixon, Oscar Guinea, Philipp Lamprecht, Vanika Sharma, Elena Sisto, and Erik van der Marel
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE)
- Abstract:
- The EU agenda for improving competitiveness is missing in action. Economic competitiveness has been a central plank in the development of the European Union – a relentless quest for policies that lead to more prosperity and that make European companies in world markets more successful. However, since the end of the Lisbon Agenda in 2010, economic competitiveness seems to have fallen off the EU map. This Agenda had its flaws, but it rightly sought to make Europe “the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-economy in the world”. The impression now is that Europe is on the retreat and the current European Commission is the first without a strategy to strengthen competitiveness at the EU level since the early 1990s. Hopefully, a course correction may now be on its way. Ursula von der Leyen has promised a “competitiveness check” on new EU policy. With the strong economic headwinds facing Europe and the world, the EU needs to pursue structural economic reforms that raise productivity and growth.
- Topic:
- European Union, Business, Regional Economy, and Competition
- Political Geography:
- Europe
16. The Business Case for the Sustainable Development Goals: An Empirical Analysis of 21 Danish Companies' Engagement with the SDGs
- Author:
- Michael W. Hansen, Henrik Gundelach, and Erik Johnson
- Publication Date:
- 09-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Centre for Business and Development Studies (CBDS), Copenhagen Business School
- Abstract:
- This paper explores why business engage with the SDG agenda, with a view to understanding the business case for the SDGs. Building on and extending the responsibility literature’s discussion of the business case for responsibility, the paper develops a conceptual framework for analyzing why business engage with the SDGs. This framework is employed to analyze why a sample of 21 Danish companies decided to engage with the SDG agenda. The analysis finds that most companies view the SDGs as a platform for achieving rather conventional business goals such as mitigating risk, saving costs, and differentiating products and services. However, in a few cases, companies use the SDGs as a lever for carving out uncontested positions in future markets. The paper concludes that companies overwhelmingly view the SDGs as a business opportunity rather than as a business responsibility, something that fundamentally may distinguish the SDG agenda from previous responsibility agendas. The paper fills a gap in the extant literature on business responsibility by developing and validating a classification of the business case for the SDGs based on economic value drivers, and by deepening the empirical understanding of, what precisely this business case may be.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, Sustainable Development Goals, Business, and Social Responsibility
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Denmark
17. To Regulate, or Not to Regulate? Subsidies for Foreign Enterprises, Climate Change, and Currency Undervaluation
- Author:
- Cheon-Kee Lee, Min Ji Kang, and Minjoo Kim
- Publication Date:
- 06-2022
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP)
- Abstract:
- In response to today’s rapidly changing global trade environment, countries have continued to make changes to their policy objectives and instruments to address new and emerging issues such as supply chain restructuring and reshoring, climate change, and currency undervaluation. To this end subsidies have been playing a particularly important role, and are expected to be used more broadly across different sectors in the coming years. While controversies over government subsidization are likely to continue at the international level, the United States and the European Union have proposed at the domestic level to expand the scope of subsidy regulation and to tighten regulation on newly emerging subsidy types beyond the traditional boundaries set by international trade rules. Among a number of the latest developments on subsidy regulation, this Brief intends to primarily focus on (i) transnational subsidies granted by a government to enterprises active in other foreign countries (“foreign subsidies”); (ii) green subsidies for climate change mitigation; and (iii) subsidies related to currency undervaluation.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, Business, Currency, Trade, and Subsidies
- Political Geography:
- Europe, North America, United States of America, and European Union
18. The low productivity of European firms: how can policies enhance the allocation of resources?
- Author:
- Gregory Claeys, Giovanni Sgaravatti, and Marie Le Mouel
- Publication Date:
- 04-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Bruegel
- Abstract:
- This paper summarises the most important policy lessons from the research undertaken in the MICROPROD project, work package 4, related to the allocation of the factors of production, with a special focus on the weak dynamism of European small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In particular, MICROPROD work package 4 investigated the impact of labour market institutions and skill shortages on firm dynamism, and which types of (foreign) competition are conducive for total factor productivity (TFP) maximizing factor allocation. The papers of this work package also explored the side effects of unconventional monetary policy and of forbearance in bank restructuring for the survival of ‘zombie’ firms, and for employment growth and the TFP of new SMEs.
- Topic:
- Monetary Policy, Business, Productivity, and Resource Allocation
- Political Geography:
- Europe
19. Is the workforce ready for the jobs of the future? Data-informed skills and training foresight
- Author:
- Fabian Stephany and Rosemary Luckin
- Publication Date:
- 05-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Bruegel
- Abstract:
- For many newly emerging jobs, labour-market mismatches prevail as workers and firms are unable to apply precise occupation taxonomies and training lags behind workforce needs. We report on how data can enable useful foresight about skill requirements and training needs, even when that data has not been collected for this express purpose. First, we show how online generated freelance data can help monitor labour-market developments in the short run. Second, in the long run, we illustrate how data can shed light on development of workplace-ready aptitudes among students, even when these are not the direct focus of instruction. This combination of data-intensive activities can inform the immediate and long-term needs for education and training in order to help individuals develop the ability to learn, train and retrain as often and as much as needed.
- Topic:
- Business, Training, Data, Labor Market, Workforce, and Skills
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Global Focus
20. Skilled Immigration, Task Allocation and the Innovation of Firms
- Author:
- Anna Maria Mayda, Gianluca Orefice, and Gianluca Santoni
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Centre d'Etudes Prospectives et d'Informations Internationales (CEPII)
- Abstract:
- This paper analyses the impact of skilled migrants on the innovation (patenting) activity of French firms between 1995 and 2010, and investigates the underlying mechanism. We present district-level and firm-level estimates and address endogeneity using a modified version of the shift-share instrument. Skilled migrants increase the number of patents at both the district and firm level. Large, high-productivity and capital-intensive firms benefit the most, in terms of innovation activity, from skilled immigrant workers. Importantly, we provide evidence that one channel through which the effect works is task specialization (as in Peri and Sparber, 2009). The arrival of skilled immigrants drives French skilled workers towards language-intensive, managerial tasks while foreign skilled workers specialize in technical, research-oriented tasks. This mechanism manifests itself in the estimated increase in the share of foreign inventors in patenting teams as a consequence of skilled migration. Through this channel, greater innovation is the result of productivity gains from specialization.
- Topic:
- Business, Immigrants, Innovation, and Skilled Labor
- Political Geography:
- Europe and France