By utilizing panel statistics of 1520 country pairs and economic integration agreements (EIAs) from 2007 to 2017, this paper presents evidence of the effect of EIAs on export margins, i.e., both extensive (firms) and intensive margins (average exports per firm). In doing so, this work adds...

EU enlargement has stalled since the last member joined over ten years ago, marking the longest period without expansion since 1973. This elapsed time contrasts with the potential income gains membership promises. Drawing on the biggest EU enlargement in 2004 and employing a synthetic...

This paper explores the role of export-oriented firms in shaping regional economic development, with a focus on their operational footprint, strategic orientation, and interaction with institutional and infrastructural environments. Set within the broader context of regional competitiveness and...

Western Balkan countries aim to intensify their path toward the European Union as an opportunity to ensure peace, economic growth, and institutional sustainability. Apart from the regional challenges, the EU integration process of the WB is affected by different geopolitical challenges, such as...

This paper presents IMF staff report on common policies for member countries of West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU). Economic growth continues to be strong in the WAEMU. Inflation has fallen back to its target range, and recent improvements in regional external imbalances are...

Focusing on a cross-border perspective, this paper identifies four key binding constraints that hinder firms' ability to innovate and scale up within the EU single market-fragmented regulations, inefficient financial intermediation, limited labor mobility, and fragmented energy market. To...

WAEMU members' trade openness, integration into global value chains (GVCs), and export diversification remain limited. Tariffs, non-tariff measures (NTMs, obstacles to trade that arise mainly from differences in national regulations), and a challenging trade environment (e.g., cumbersome Customs...

Somalia's accession to the East African Community (EAC) presents a transformative opportunity to accelerate its economic development and integrate more effectively into the regional economy. With membership, Somalia could access a broader market of over 300 million people, enhancing trade and...

Ever since their independence, African countries have engaged in a series of treaties creating 8 Regional Economic Communities (RECs) that were (and still are) to pilot this integration starting with a Free Trade Area (FTA) followed by a customs union, a common market, and a monetary union...

This paper examines how EU Technical Barriers to Trade (TBTs) reshape firms’ global supply chains, extending Grossman et al. (2024) to incorporate adaptation costs between sourcing partners. To test the model’s predictions, we construct a novel dataset linking EU TBTs to French firm-level...

This paper draws a concise overview of the economic relationship between the European Union (EU) and selected Asian regions in the context of the twin transition - green and digital. A series of significant initiatives adopted in recent years to consolidate the cooperation with these regions are...

This paper analyzes developmental trajectories in the EU. In doing so, it diagnoses economic polarization on two different levels: for one, we observe a divergence of average incomes across EU countries as a persistent empirical feature associated with European integration. For another, European...

A study conducted by the European Parliamentary Research Service (2023) notes that the European Union's (EU) relations with Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) countries are being affected by changes in global power, economic uncertainty, and security threats. The current working paper...

In this paper, we analyze the regional trade introversion indexes (RTIIs) for regional trading arrangements (RTAs)with various numbers of differently developed participants and different depths of economic integration. The analyszed RTAs stem from all inhabited continents. We compare three types...

This paper analyzes developmental trajectories in the EU. In doing so, it diagnoses economic polarization on two different levels: for one, we observe a divergence of average incomes across EU countries as a persistent empirical feature associated with European integration. For another, European...

How does dismantling deep integration affect international trade? This paper provides new evidence on the consequences of disintegration by estimating the impact of Brexit on goods trade by UK firms. The UK’s exit from the EU’s single market and customs union in January 2021 led to an...

EU enlargement has stalled since the last member joined over ten years ago, marking the longest period without expansion since 1973. This elapsed time contrasts with the potential income gains membership promises. Drawing on the biggest EU enlargement in 2004 and employing a synthetic...

Foreign trade plays a central role in Armenia's economic development, shaping GDP through both internal and external factors. In small and open economies such as Armenia, external trade and integration strategies are decisive for growth. The state budget data for 2022-2024 underline this...

The integration of the digital and real economies (DRI) is an inevitable trend in future economic growth. This study measures DRI levels across 30 Chinese provinces from 2012 to 2022 using a coupling coordination model with panel data and empirically examines DRI's impact on industrial structure...

This paper analyses the transformative 2025 political agreement redefining Gibraltar's relationship with the European Union (EU) in the post-Brexit era. Historically a British Overseas Territory with strategic significance, Gibraltar has long occupied a unique legal and geopolitical position....

The trade strategy of the European Union has experienced substantial transformations in the initial two decades of the millennium, focusing on Asia, the strategy emphasises competitive bilateralism, shared values, and alignment with European trade standards. The EU's trade strategy has been...

Background: Recent global disruptions have exposed the vulnerability of international supply chains, prompting a shift toward regionalization to enhance economic resilience. As a European Union (EU) member, Croatia has an opportunity to strengthen its integration into EU regional value chains...

Empirical models of trade agreements implicitly assume that withdrawal from a trade agreement has an equal and opposite trade effect as accession, i.e., symmetry. With increasing opposition to international economic cooperation, it becomes urgent to test this assumption. We analyze a...

The biannual Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit meetings are a fixed component of regional summit diplomacy. Internationally, however, they tend to attract little to no attention. This is partly due to their reputation as mere "talk shops" that rarely produce concrete results...

Legal rights continue to differ between women and men, particularly in developing countries. In this paper, we examine whether economic integration can improve gender equality by law. We design a novel instrumental variable strategy based on regional waves of globalization, which serve as strong...

The service sector has been a key driver of growth in the European Union (EU) over the past two decades. However, despite the principle of free movement of services, the single market still faces significant national barriers and remains a patchwork of 27 systems across member states....

Regions worldwide are increasingly establishing customs unions, yet their impact on trade remains uncertain. This study investigates the influence of the East African Community (EAC) customs union on intra-regional trade performance, specifically assessing whether customs unions affect exports,...

Objective: The article aims to evaluate the growth effects of the 2007 Eastern enlargement of the European Union (EU) for the New Member States (NMS). Research Design & Methods: To study the growth effects of the 2007 Eastern enlargement we apply the synthetic control method (SCM). The synthetic...

The service sector has been a key driver of growth in the European Union (EU) over the past two decades. However, despite the principle of free movement of services, the single market still faces significant national barriers and remains a patchwork of 27 systems across member states....

In order to measure the current status of Northeast Asian regional cooperation, more specifically in order to comprehensively evaluate whether the region is in a state of cooperation or conflict, this paper adopts a revised and improved combination of approaches used in three existing...