Regional Convergence in the European Union: Results from a Panel Data Model

This paper evaluates the convergence process for different samples of European Union regions during the period 1982-1999 by using fixed effects panel data regressions. This estimation method allows us to control for unobserved time-invariant heterogeneity in cross-sectional models. The results of growth rates are significantly negatively related to income levels and show that the convergence relationship holds. However when regions are bound to very different steady state positions, convergence to a common income level appears to be impossible.

The Regional Policy of the European Union and the Enlargement Process to Central and Eastern European Countries

The successive enlargement processes of the European Union have implied reforms in Regional Policy. Since the Single European Act (1987), Europe has got a structural policy mainly focused on regions whose development is lagging behind. The accession of CEECs will mean an extraordinary increase in regional development disparities. However, the current EU Regional Policy is addressed to deal with such a kind of development lags. Competition in a large market combined with regional development policy of the EU is a successful policy mix to boost growth of CEECs in the framework of an open market economy. The own success of regional policy in current objective 1 regions will led to an important reduction of assisted population. The financial perspectives approved in the Berlin Summit (March 1999) provides enough financial space to assist 90% of population in CEECs and 75% of current population under objective 1. The main challenge involved in the successful extension of EU Regional Policy to CEECs lies in the field of management capabilities and administration reforms that must be carried out in these countries.Regional Policy, European Union, Central and Eastern European Countries

Population Potentials and Development Levels: Empirical Findings in the European Union

In this paper we deal with the issue of the spatial structure of Europe. In order to carry out our study, we use the technique of gravity models to compute population potentials, and then plot potential maps, which allow us to represent the main lines of force in terms of the geographical distribution of the population and consequently the main economic activity in the area as well. We also use the data which corresponds to the future acceding countries in order to better analyse the effects of European Union enlargement from a spatial perspective. The findings about the spatial structure of Europe were carried out to a further stage, testing econometrically the explanatory power that population potentials have on the levels of development. Using a logarithm specification for the relationship between population potentials and levels of development and estimating cross-section regressions for different time periods we evaluated if the explanatory power of the population potentials was hold constant over time or if on the contrary it was decreasing as long as we move forward testing our model for the latest data available (1999). Our proposed relationship was estimated in different years, 1982, 1989, 1994, 1997 and 1999. What we have found is that closeness to large consumer markets or in other words, market potential, was an important explanatory variable for regional income in the early eighties and that it has decreased its significance in determining regions income on the 1990´s. Thus dynamic income regions have also emerged in the periphery, and need not necessarily be close to rich regions. The main reasons for this tendency reside in a trend towards the delocalisation of economic activities driven by technical advances in transport, information and communication, together with tendencies towards convergence in a unified economic space and the impulse generated by the new EU regional policy which began in 1987 after the European Single Act. JEL classification: A12; J11; N30; R23 Keywords: Spatial structure; Population Potential contours; Spatial planning; Potential maps; Population settlements

El contexto de la democracia y la participación en el sistema capitalista

La siguiente reflexión analiza las estructuras y los elementos del Estado moderno, sus primeras manifestaciones, pasando por su evolución y los fundamentos teóricos que se le fueron sumando en el contexto de la democracia capitalista y sus diversas formas de expresión en las distintas sociedades. Ubicadas en el marco formal del Estado moderno encontramos al mercado político en el que aparecen tanto la teoría de la representatividad como los partidos políticos; organizaciones indispensables para efectuarla y sin los cuales sería difícil comprender la política en sus modalidades de interlocución, negociación y demandas sociales. En este sentido también se mencionan cuestiones referentes a la administración tecnocrática del Estado y la precisión de los marcos teóricos de algunos de sus principales representantes, así como las referentes a la construcción de la ingeniería social de la democracia

Newtonian, Post Newtonian and Parameterized Post Newtonian limits of f(R, G) gravity

We discuss in detail the weak field limit of f(R,G) gravity taking into account analytic functions of the Ricci scalar R and the Gauss-Bonnet invariant G. Specifically, we develop, in metric formalism, the Newtonian, Post Newtonian and Parameterized Post Newtonian limits starting from general f(R, G) Lagrangian. The special cases of f(R) and f(G) gravities are considered. In the case of the Newtonian limit of f(R, G) gravity, a general solution in terms of Green's functions is achieved.Comment: 26 page

Regional Policy and Convergence in Europe: The Case of Backward Regions

This paper analyzes the performance of regions whose development is lagging behind since the institutionalization of the EU regional policy, (1989). Results from a panel data model with fixed effects prove that backward regions have been catching up with the EU average income since the launching of the first programming period, the so called Delors'I package, 1989-1993