N01 - Development of the Discipline: Historiographical; Sources and MethodsReturn

In 2000 the European Council adopted to the European Union for a period of 10 years the aim to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable economic growth with more jobs and better working place, including social cohesion and respect for the environment. The Lisbon strategy was than followed up by the Europe 2020 strategy, which incorporated the revised goals of the Lisbon Strategy in order to become the most competitive economy in the world. Howerver the concept of the competitive state remains unclear. This article aims to show the major currents of thought and definitions, respectively, the concept of competitiveness of countries. The article is based on literary research, and summarizes the main concepts and definitions of competitiveness of nations, the concept of "external competitiveness", the concept of "aggregate competitiveness", the concept of "multi-criteria competitiveness" and finally, the concept of "systemic competitiveness". The main contribution of the article is the clear description of the conceptual and theoretical concept of the competitiveness of the countries and the identification of decisive factors and determinants of the competitiveness of the nations.

The concluding episode briefly introduces a few more important female celebrities in economics, who have not been described in the previous sections. There are many heterogeneous women authors worth bringing to mind. Their references and writings improve the economic science level similarly to many men colleagues awarded with most important economic prizes.

The article deals with the question of the present position of economic history as a theoretical framework of scientific specialization and university study branch in the Czech Republic. It focuses on the Central European tradition and analyzes reasons for the connection between economic and social history. It concentrates on the question whether economic history can exist as an autonomous discipline, on which theoretical basis economic history could be built, and from where to derive methodological inspiration. The authors claim that currently the social historians do not consider the connection with economic history as pivotal. They regard the position of economic history as inferior and according to them the dominant role of social history prevents them from dynamic methodological development. They believe that possible alternatives of the future development of economic and social history lie in three potential solutions: a) continuation of the current "defensive" concept of economic and social history; b) separation of economic and social history and their autonomous shaping; c) concept of "offensive" integrating socio-scientific approach.