Southeastern Europe,Transitions, and the EU – Is Ever-widening Desirable?

The paper addresses the issue of further widening of the EU, given theevident tensions between deepening and widening, in light of thecommitments made to southeastern Europe since the Kosovo intervention.After clarifying the portent of Kosovo for the EU's enlargement, themeaning of EU integration in its proper context is recalled. Mext thepaper sketches how the approach to southeastern Europe fits into therelations the EU has built up with transition economies. Thereafter itexamines the promises made to southeastern Europe, the nature of theagreements entertained for southeastern Europe, and what has since cometo the fore. Before concluding, the paper proposes a more realisticassistance approach, given the area's urgent need for economic, political,and social transformations prior to lodging a credible request for EUmembership.     

Antidumping protection hurts exporters: firm-level evidence

This paper estimates the impact of antidumping protection on export behavior of French firms covered by antidumping cases. Traditional models suggest that all domestic firms covered by antidumping protection should benefit from protection. However, in an environment of globally fragmented supply chains, firms may be damaged by protection if duties increase input costs for firms covered by the protection. Results from this paper indicate that while non-exporting firms benefit from protection, domestic sales of export-oriented firms and exports in general, are depressed due to protection. This effect is more severe for multinational firms.     

EU Widening and Deepening – Are these goals reconcilable?

The paper examines the compatibility between widening the EU and deepening its integration endeavors, with special emphasis on eastward enlargement. After clarifying the broad nature of the accession negotiations under way, it sketches the most critical obstacles encountered in forging ahead with EU deepening, the problems posed by the ongoing restructuring of the accession candidates, and how deepening and widening necessarily interact. Before concluding with an aside on the relationship between the accession process and the EU's designs on assisting southeastern Europe, the paper briefly reviews where the negotiations stand in mid-2001 and elaborates on what may be in store for the enlargement process in the near term.The opinions expressed here are mine and do not necessarily reflect my employer's.     

Import Churning and Export Performance of Multi‐product Firms

This paper analyses the impact of churning in the imported varieties of capital and intermediate inputs on firm export scope and productivity. Using detailed data on imports and exports at the firm‐product‐market level, we document substantial churning in both imports and exports for Slovenian manufacturing firms in the period 1994–2008. On average, a firm changes about one‐quarter of imported and exported product‐markets every year, while gross churning in terms of added and dropped product‐markets is almost three times higher. A substantial share of this product churning is due to simultaneous imports and exports of firms in identical varieties within the same CN‐8 product code (so called pass‐on‐trade). We find that churning in imported varieties is far more important than reduction in tariffs or declines in import prices for firms’ productivity growth and increased export product scope. We also find gross churning has a bigger impact on firm productivity improvements by a factor of more than 10 in comparison with net churning. Both adding and dropping of imported input varieties thus seem to be of utmost importance for firms aiming to optimise their input mix towards their most valuable inputs. These effects are further enhanced when excluding simultaneous trade in identical varieties, suggesting that pass‐on‐trade has less favourable effects on firms’ long‐run performance than regular trade.     

Staying Home or Moving Away? Restructuring Efforts within Multinational Enterprises

This paper analyses the impact of geographic dispersion on employment changes within multinationals. Building on earlier work of Landier et al. (2009, Review of Financial Studies 22, 3: 1119), we investigate whether corporate decision‐making within a multinational is affected by the distance between an affiliate and its headquarter. Our findings suggest a detrimental impact of distance on employees, by either an increased likelihood of observing a downsizing event, or by witnessing a larger decrease in the number of employees at distant locations during downsizing events. In addition, our results seem to relate the higher likelihood of observing a downsizing event to the role of social factors on decision making. The more visible a manager is in his community, the less likely he is to downsize proximate divisions.