The Economic Policy of European Union (by Case of center and Periphery countries)

Abstract

Building of the new economic strategy for Ukraine, focused on Eurointegration, makes one consider for both positive and possible negative effects of the European Union’s development for Ukraine. The Ukrainian economy is forced to implement reforms of the internal and external economic component by relying on EU practices in integration reforms.
 The importance of this topic is caused by the need to investigate the impact of the single economic course pursued by EU on setting priority areas of reforms of domestic economic policies in center and periphery countries of this integration association. The article’s objective is to reveal the content of the socio-economic policy in EU and its impact on the EU operation in terms of the relationship between the performance of center and periphery countries.
 The studies presented in the articles show that the economic integration has complex character and calls for detailed analysis of internal and external processes in countries as components of the system at macroeconomic level of the integration association. Based on the analysis of the above mentioned regional distribution of EU, the following EU countries (most successful and most problematic) were selected as representative ones for the study: Germany and France as “center”, and Greece and Hungary as “periphery”. A socio-economic analysis of key indicators is made, and the role of each of the above countries in the EU development is revealed. A comparative analysis of the selected EU countries is made through trend analysis; their development outlook is given. 
 The achievement of the goals of the single EU strategy is analyzed by priority areas of economic policy reforms in the member countries, intended to stabilize their economies: i) recover the fiscal stability; ii) ensure the financial stability; iii) implement the reforms promoting growth and employment; and iv) modernize the public sector. The analysis confirms the prospect of strong economic positions for center countries, which is shown by the approximation ratio that was close to 1 in all the studied cases. Due to the problems of periphery countries, highlighted in the article, these countries may be incapable to meet the convergence criteria fixed in the EU strategy or pursue the single economic course, thus creating a threat of economic crisis for the whole EU.