Federalism – serie

The book addresses the issue of investment in Europe, adopting a European economic policy approach. In the first part, a review of investment policy in Europe, as well as a macroeconomic theoretical perspective, are provided to better appreciate recent developments within a new investment narrative. By analyzing the context in which investment support policies have taken place at European level since the origins of what is now the EU, through the 2008 financial crisis, and considering the effects of the current pandemic crisis, the book proposes possible solutions based on internal and external investment plans for a new European economic model. In particular, three aspects are examined. First, the implication of the green transition on the social dimension; second, the opportunity to strengthen the partnership with Africa; third, how a large-scale investment plan could be financed.

She was young, a determined fighter against Nazism in Germany; she was an independent socialist, a tireless writer against hatred and war; and she was an extremely courageous woman. All this would be enough to secure Hilda Monte a prominent place in the history of resistance to barbarism in 20th century Europe. Furthermore, she designed a project for a federal Europe that remains unparalleled. Among the many proposals for the future European peace, this one stands out. She edited her project in October 1943 with the renowned London publisher Victor Gollancz.Her plea: for European countries to finally put an end to the "old game of sovereignty". Lasting peace and economic development required a genuine "European revolution": solidarity throughout Europe, common federal structures, based on a shared history and the common values of humanism. She was aware that this path would be a difficult one. Hilda Monte was born in Vienna in 1914, grew up in Berlin and wrote her first newspaper articles against the rise of Hitler when she was 17. In 1933 she witnessed the "seizure of power" in Berlin. Exile in Paris and London followed. But Hilda Monte wanted to do more than just write against Nazism, and so she undertook dangerous trips to Germany. On 17 April 1945, while returning from a mission "on the ground" for the Austrian resistance, which she considered an act of European solidarity, she was shot and killed on the border near Feldkirch. Her treatise "The Unity of Europe", newly published here, is the lasting legacy of an eminent European resistance fighter.

2024 marks the 80th anniversary of the Bretton Woods conference, where the foundations of a new international economic and monetary order were laid down. After the end of the fixed exchange-rates regime between 1971 and 1973, the US dollar hegemony was strengthened while the international system was dominated by increasing global imbalances and greater vulnerability of the world economy.This was mainly due to the built-in destabilizer that characterizes each international monetary system relying on a national currency to provide global liquidity: the essence of the Triffin dilemma.Since the Great Financial Crisis an attempt was made towards a more equitable, multilateral economic governance system. But the last few years have also brought more fragmentation, shortening of global value chains and attempts to fence off negative transnational externalities deriving from various sources of interdependence (even with autarchic and neocolonial responses). Worse yet the pandemic and military conflicts reinforced the logic of blocks while the need for increased supranational public goods or reduced negative public bads is becoming pressing.This book suggests that a way to recover a path towards multilateralism is strengthened regional integration. This may help return on a path of trans-national confidence and cooperation and implement a new multilayered architecture of the international monetary system. "This book is an indispensable reading at a time when one of the essential tasks of the international community is to move towards a new monetary order and a reform of the International monetary fund (IMF) associating the new regional monetary unions to the management of a common currency: the Special Drawing Right (SDR)."Michel Camdessus, Former Managing Director, IMF; Honorary Governor, Bank of France