The Political Economy of Adjustment Throughout and Beyond the Eurozone Crisis
The Political Economy of Adjustment Throughout and Beyond the Eurozone Crisis

Author: Michele Chang

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-08-08

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 0429762496

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This volume focuses on the aftermath of the euro crisis and whether the reforms have brought about lasting changes to the economic and political structures of the crisis countries or if the changes were short-term and easily abandoned post-bailout and post-recovery. Starting with an analysis of the state of euro area governance at the onset of the crisis and the ensuing reforms, the book considers structural conditions as well as those specific to the domestic political economy of most of the countries affected by the crisis, including Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and Italy. It presents up-to-date and incisive analysis of the aftermath of the crisis and suggests how we can situate it within our understanding of different national growth models in Europe. This book will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners interested in the Euro Crisis, Economic and Monetary Union, European Union and European politics and more broadly to Comparative Politics, Political Economy, International Relations, Economics, Finance, Business and Industry.

Oil and the political economy in the Middle East
Oil and the political economy in the Middle East

Author: Martin Beck

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2021-08-17

Total Pages: 205

ISBN-13: 1526149087

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The downhill slide in the global price of crude oil, which started mid-2014, had major repercussions across the Middle East for net oil exporters, as well as importers closely connected to the oil-producing countries from the Gulf. Following the Arab uprisings of 2010 and 2011, the oil price decline represented a second major shock for the region in the early twenty-first century – one that has continued to impose constraints, but also provided opportunities. Offering the first comprehensive analysis of the Middle Eastern political economy in response to the 2014 oil price decline, this book connects oil market dynamics with an understanding of socio-political changes. Inspired by rentierism, the contributors present original studies on Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The studies reveal a large diversity of country-specific policy adjustment strategies: from the migrant workers in the Arab Gulf, who lost out in the post-2014 period but were incapable of repelling burdensome adjustment policies, to Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon, who have never been able to fulfil the expectation that they could benefit from the 2014 oil price decline. With timely contributions on the COVID-19-induced oil price crash in 2020, this collection signifies that rentierism still prevails with regard to both empirical dynamics in the Middle East and academic discussions on its political economy.

The Politics of Bad Options
The Politics of Bad Options

Author: Stefanie Walter

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2020-11-12

Total Pages: 321

ISBN-13: 0192599097

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Why was the Eurozone crisis so difficult to resolve? Why was it resolved in a manner in which some countries bore a much larger share of the pain than other countries? Why did no country leave the Eurozone rather than implement unprecedented austerity? Who supported and opposed the different policy options in the crisis domestically, and how did the distributive struggles among these groups shape crisis politics? Building on macro-level statistical data, original survey data from interest groups, and qualitative comparative case studies, this book argues and shows that the answers to these questions revolve around distributive struggles about how the costs of the Eurozone crisis should be divided among countries, and within countries, among different socioeconomic groups. Together with divergent but strongly held ideas about the 'right way' to conduct economic policy and asymmetries in the distribution of power among actors, severe distributive concerns of important actors lie at the root of the difficulties of resolving the Eurozone crisis as well as the difficulties to substantially reform EMU. The book provides new insights into the politics of the Eurozone crisis by emphasizing three perspectives that have received scant attention in existing research: a comparative perspective on the Eurozone crisis by systematically comparing it to previous financial crises, an analysis of the whole range of policy options, including the ones not chosen, and a unified framework that examines crisis politics not just in deficit-debtor, but also in surplus-creditor countries.

Imbalance
Imbalance

Author: Tobias Schulze-Cleven

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-03-30

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13: 1000370186

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Germany is a central case for research on comparative political economy, which has inspired theorizing on national differences and historical trajectories. This book assesses Germany’s political economy after the end of the "social democratic" 20th century to rethink its dominant properties and create new opportunities for using the country as a powerful lens into the evolution of democratic capitalism. Documenting large-scale changes and new tensions in the welfare state, company strategies, interest intermediation, and macroeconomic governance, the volume makes the case for analysing contemporary Germany through the politics of imbalance rather than the long-standing paradigm of institutional stability. This conceptual reorientation around inequalities and disparities provides much-needed traction for clarifying the causal dynamics that govern ongoing processes of institutional recomposition. Delving into the politics of imbalance, the volume explicates the systemic properties of capitalism, multivalent policy feedback, and the organizational foundations of creative adjustment as key vantage points for understanding new forms of distributional conflict within and beyond Germany. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of German Politics.

European Union Political Economy
European Union Political Economy

Author: Konstantinos Hazakis

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2018-09-15

Total Pages: 367

ISBN-13: 1498560067

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The European political economy: policy and theory, provides students, researchers and policy makers with a profound understanding of the theory and policy of the EU. The book covers in a comprehensive way the key issue areas of the European Union activity and it includes an analysis of all the important current developments in Europe such as the Brexit, the European Union sovereign debt crisis, the European economic governance problems and the macroeconomic adjustment challenges within Eurozone. The book also includes critical resources for readers and students such as review questions, appendixes, references and further reading lists. More specifically, the textbook explains thoroughly the institutional, economic and policy characteristics of the fundamental issue areas of European economy. It outlines the institutions and mechanisms of European union/Eurozone, the common agricultural, regional and trade policies, the impact of the single market and the single currency on European economy, the enlargement process and the key questions on the European macroeconomic adjustment process. In each chapter the book explains not only what is taking place in European economy but also which the feasible options of the European policy agenda are. The textbook enables readers to apply conceptual and theoretical knowledge to economic and political processes of European integration.

Financial Crisis Management and Democracy
Financial Crisis Management and Democracy

Author: Bettina De Souza Guilherme

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-12-09

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 3030548953

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This open access book discusses financial crisis management and policy in Europe and Latin America, with a special focus on equity and democracy. Based on a three-year research project by the Jean Monnet Network, this volume takes an interdisciplinary, comparative approach, analyzing both the role and impact of the EU and regional organizations in Latin America on crisis management as well as the consequences of crisis on the process of European integration and on Latin America’s regionalism. The book begins with a theoretical introduction, exploring the effects of the paradigm change on economic policies in Europe and in Latin America and analyzing key systemic aspects of the unsustainability of the present economic system explaining the global crises and their interconnections. The following chapters are divided into sections. The second section explores aspects of regional governance and how the economic and financial crises were managed on a macro level in Europe and Latin America. The third and fourth sections use case studies to drill down to the impact of the crises at the national and regional levels, including the emergence of political polarization and rise in populism in both areas. The last section presents proposals for reform, including the transition from finance capitalism to a sustainable real capitalism in both regions and at the inter-regional level of EU-LAC relations.The volume concludes with an epilogue on financial crises, regionalism, and domestic adjustment by Loukas Tsoukalis, President of the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP). Written by an international network of academics, practitioners and policy advisors, this volume will be of interest to researchers and students interested in macroeconomics, comparative regionalism, democracy, and financial crisis management as well as politicians, policy advisors, and members of national and regional organizations in the EU and Latin America.

Europe Today
Europe Today

Author: Erik Jones

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2023-03-27

Total Pages: 509

ISBN-13: 1538110946

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Now in its sixth edition, Europe Today presents unrivaled coverage of developments in major European countries and across the region. Thoroughly revised and updated—including new chapters on Turkey and the wider European neighborhood to address their growing influence—this is the only work that offers a sustained and unified set of both country case studies and thematic chapters on the European Union. Written by leading scholars from Europe and North America, the book shows a range of perspectives on the process of European integration, the evolution of economic performance, and the reaction to multiculturalism and immigration. Highlighting the impact of the global economic crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian war in Ukraine, and the struggle to assert Europe’s voice more widely, the contributors provide a pragmatic assessment of what Europeans have accomplished and what challenges they continue to face. Each chapter builds on a foundation of basic political information and explanation to develop distinctive and thought-provoking contributions to current debates. Informative and engaging, this comprehensive text leads readers toward a coherent and informed view of Europe today.

Why Banks Fail
Why Banks Fail

Author: Sebastián Royo

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-06-27

Total Pages: 362

ISBN-13: 1137532289

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This book examines the political roots of banking crises in Spain. It focuses on the process of political bargains in which parties with different interests come together to form coalitions, and it shows how these coalitions have determined banking outcomes and caused banking crises in Spain. In particular, it analyzes the 2008 Spanish banking crisis and shows how Spanish banks and related savings institutions contributed significantly to the challenges that led to the crisis, including the fueling of a large property bubble – by channeling tremendous credits to the construction and real estate sectors, while starving the country’s productive sectors. Accordingly, the book links banking crises to the country’s larger institutional malaise, placing the solution not only in the hands of the banks, but also the political institutions that influence them.

Remaking European Political Economies
Remaking European Political Economies

Author: Dennis Zagermann

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2023-12-18

Total Pages: 193

ISBN-13: 1487552289

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From 2009 to 2015, the euro area of the European Union (EU) experienced an existential socio-economic crisis. To secure its institutional integrity, the EU designed several new institutions to support member states in need but also to facilitate socio-economic adjustments. The European Stability Mechanism (ESM) lies at the centre of this strategy: it provides financial assistance to member states in severe crisis on an intergovernmental basis while demanding compliance with adjustment programs from program countries. Based on a comparative political economic analysis, Remaking European Political Economies shows that the EU’s financial assistance programs focused strongly on reforms that led to a partial convergence of program countries based on market-based economic governance and reduced governmental influence in the economy. The book draws on extensive, empirically based case studies of two prominent euro area countries in crisis: Greece and Ireland. Dennis Zagermann illustrates that socio-economic models in the euro area can experience institutional change if exposed to severe crises in combination with financial assistance programs that include policy conditionality. In doing so, his book sheds light on the central question of whether there is a possible convergence of European models of capitalism – a question that has been at the centre of comparative political economic debates for over thirty years.

The New Political Economy of Greece up to 2030
The New Political Economy of Greece up to 2030

Author: Panagiotis E. Petrakis

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-10-31

Total Pages: 340

ISBN-13: 303047075X

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This book not only analyzes and evaluates the current state of economic growth and development in Greece, but also investigates the potential for growth and development in the mid- to long-term horizon. This book presents a unique theoretical framework drawing on structural elements of political economy such as institutions, cultural background, and the complex nature of politics and political power, as well as neoclassical economics and behavioral economics. The first part of the book introduces readers to some key concepts of normative analysis from a theoretical and methodological perspective, presents the relation between theory and policy, placing the Greek economy within the framework of the Eurozone, and provides the political economy of integrated growth and development in Greek economy. The second part of the book describes the current condition of Greece in the global economy and attempts to detect the major social, economic and political trends that will prevail in the Greek society, while pointing the challenges that the Greek economy will face across the coming decade by taking into account the Covid-19 crisis. The third part of the book provides an overview of growth and development theory as specifically applied to Greece, focusing on the endogenous forces driving the economy, and portrays how the 2008 financial crisis and the crisis of Covid-19 transformed the framework of Greek growth and development policy, to the ground of a new consolidated situation of low growth, low inflation and low employment in the case of Greek economy.