F02 - International Economic Order and IntegrationReturn

The European Union and the United States of America present the world's largest exporter and importer of goods, services and capital. The idea of increasing foreign trade between them based on the implementation of the lowest degree of economic integration, a free trade area, is not new. A proposal was made in the 1990s to create a Transatlantic Free Trade Area between the EU and member countries of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which has not been successfully implemented. Nowadays, it is getting back to the forefront of interest among not only politicians but also economists. Whether political or economic pressures are behind this step, it is important to understand the general principle of the functioning of the free trade area. The aim of this paper is to illustrate the basic characteristics of the free trade area on the example of the EU and the US.

Even though the efforts to foster global economic governance have been a longstanding issue of global economic policies, their effectiveness has been questioned by the current crisis. The crisis has revealed many systemic issues that would require global solutions on the one hand, but on the other hand, these solutions are more difficult to achieve. Based on an analysis of basic systemic issues of global trade and finance, the aim of this paper is to explore whether the current crisis leads to fostering supranational features in global economic governance. The issue is first studied at the theoretical level the outcomes of which are subsequently applied to recent evolutions in global governance, which seems to be the most appropriate level to face global systemic issues. According to the authors, more supranational features should be reflected namely in a more effective and intensive coordination of macroeconomic policies of systemically important countries in order to keep the global economic system stable. In the conclusion, the authors try to make a specific recommendation for the eventuality that the hypothesis on stronger supranational coordination cannot be fully confirmed.

The process of the economic globalization limiting the autonomy of national subjects completed the disintegration of the Westphalian system. The rebirth of regionalism, as another phase of the world economy regionalization, is a logical defensive reaction. However, apart from the regional labour division, a new regionalism emerges, interconnecting even distant subjects. Next to the usual economic reasons, the new regionalism is motivated also by the strengthening of regional resistance. It is the strategy that plays a major role in the development of regionalism.

There are many sophisticated discussions about the possible effects of the regional economic cooperation. Their results have been ambiguous. However, it is evident that regional trade agreements (RTAs) have been increasingly transforming international trade, especially since the second half of the 1990s. The region of South-East Asia has become more interested in such cooperation only after the Asian financial crisis in 1997. Especially the case of Japan proves how the Asian governments have changed their approach to the international economic cooperation. They shifted the emphasis from the multilateral negotiations under the umbrella of the WTO to regional and bilateral agreements. However, despite its fast pace the process of regionalism in South-East Asia is still at the very beginning. It remains to be seen whether the Asian countries will stay on the level of broader FTAs or whether they will follow the European example of a deep economic and political integration.

Globalization, multilateralism and regionalism are the most significant tendencies of today's world economy. Their mutual relation has bee so far studied mainly as a dilemma between globally free trade and world economy's fragmentation through competing trade blocks. With the upsurge of globalization and sharp global competition in globalization latest wave, multilateralism and regionalism has, however, changed markedly. Subsequently, their mutual relations have changed as well. Based upon the study of New Regionalism, which leads towards more complex and open trade agreements, it seems that multilateralism and regionalism can be understood as compatible dimensions of broader efforts on an economic reform of globalized world order. It is, today, formed by a deep and transparent global governance (WTO) and a global network of complex economic integration agreements (New Regionalism). The aim of this article is to study the development of their interaction and conditions of their multi-dimensional coexistence.

The Geopolitical divide that separated Europe did not allow Germany on one side and Poland and Czechoslovakia on the other side to prosper from the potential of their relations. It has rapidly changed after the end of the Cold War, when both sides concluded and began to engage in many bilateral and multilateral treaties and cooperation that culminated in 2004 with the eastern enlargement of the EU. This paper deals with the German approach towards Poland and the present-day Czech Republic at bilateral as well as multilateral level during and before the enlargement itself and combines both political and economic points of view. The outline is based on examination of essential political documents and their further practical effects. The analysis of German approach is based on the characteristic of bilateral relations of the Federal Republic of Germany to the both countries, German incentives for enlargement of the EU as well as different intensity of relations of respected countries.