Research
You will find a complete range of our monographs, muti-authored and edited works including peer-reviewed, original scholarly research across the social sciences and aligned disciplines. We publish long and short form research and you can browse the complete Bristol University Press and Policy Press archive.
Policy Press also publishes policy reviews and polemic work which aim to challenge policy and practice in certain fields. These books have a practitioner in mind and are practical, accessible in style, as well as being academically sound and referenced.
Books: Research
When the euro’s creators decided to go for a large area from the outset, the majority expert opinion was that this decision was motivated by political considerations and completely disregarded the economics of a monetary union. The contrary position advanced in this chapter is that while the euro’s creators ignored the standard economic theory of monetary unions, they did not ignore the harsh economic realities of the new global financial landscape. In the end, their eventual decision to include as many euro-candidate countries as was possible in the new currency union was to allow the latter to provide effective shelter against rising global financial pressures in general and against the gravitational force of the dollar in particular.
All of the advantages that keep the dollar firmly embedded in the dense network of international currency transactions stem from the huge size gap separating the US financial markets from all other financial markets. Unless this gap is closed there will be no end to dollar dominance. Most of the countries that belong to, or are allies of, the BRICS association want to challenge the dollar but do not have sufficient financial market size to mount this challenge. By contrast, China does have the potential to grow its domestic financial markets to a size that can enable it to challenge the dollar, but this chapter will argue that it has no serious intent to realize this potential.
A strong euro offers a possibility of effecting change in the global institutional architecture. The only institutions with a global remit are those that essentially play a rule-coordinating or rule-complying role. What are now needed are global institutions equipped with interventionist powers of correction and distribution. Given the enormous degree of global private wealth concentration, the first of such institutions should be a global tax authority charged with operating a global wealth tax. The extent to which the United States’ rich individuals dominate the global wealth pyramid, courtesy in large part of the same factors that underpin the dollar’s international dominance, coupled with the power that these individuals have over the United States’ two major political parties, mean that the greatest opposition to any radical global institutional change will come from the United States. A euro that can rival the dollar may not guarantee such change, but it will raise above zero the chance of its eventual realization.
Focusing on inward foreign direct investment (FDI) screening, this book provides an in-depth analysis of how European states’ economic interactions with China have become a security issue.
Based on 100 interviews with scholars, journalists, policy makers, and politicians from across Europe, the book underscores the importance of the policy making process that led to the adoption of investment screening in European nations. It adopts the theory of securitization to analyse the passage of the status of Chinese FDI from economy to security. In doing so, it shows how the shifting view of Europeans is attributed to changes such as China’s growing economic presence, the persistence of non-market practices, the loss of competitiveness, and the use of economic statecraft.
This chapter tests the criticism by analysing the role that economic competitiveness – rather than national security – had in shaping part of Europe’s economic security discourse. The chapter also places the accent on the importance of personal preferences of influential actors, such as prime ministers and ministers, in shaping the national – but also regional – economic security debate and agenda. In the cases of the more protectionist countries the process of securitization was triggered by an existing propensity to protect national assets, by the EU-level debate, and by the decision of national stakeholders to address the issue domestically. Remarkably, Italy stands out as the only case in this book where the screening mechanism is repeatedly employed to prevent Chinese acquisitions before they reached the notification stage, and even retroactively unravelling existing deals.
This chapter traces the transformation of economic interactions between the EU and China, specifically Chinese investments, from being welcomed to becoming a security concern for the EU. It treats the EU as a single actor, capable of proposing and adopting legislation and making decisions as a unified entity. The analysis of the process that led to adoption of the EU framework for FDI screening firstly demonstrates how a divisive policy, such as a security approach to the economy, was embraced by most actors and member states and normalized. Secondly, it examines the interplay between security and economic aspects in the EU–China relationship. The chapter analyses the process that led to the perception of FDI and other economic interactions as security threats. The analysis focuses on three key elements: the role of Chinese investments, the influence of economic and security considerations, and the main actors involved in the process.
The focus of this book is on Europe, but economic security is a global debate. In Europe and in the world, it has been moving forward from screening FDI into areas that include supply chains, trade, data management, and economic coercion, to mention a few. Since 2017, countries such as Australia, China, Japan, South Korea, and the US have all implemented significant restrictions on economic openness based on security concerns. These changes have accelerated rapidly since the Covid-19 pandemic between 2020 and 2023. A number of plurilateral frameworks and fora with a strong economic security agenda have emerged. Notably, the G7 has prioritized economic security and coordination. This chapter provides an overview of how other global actors approach economic security and compares them with the current state of affairs and debates in the EU and the UK.
This book shows that foreign direct investments from China have been at the forefront of tensions between economic opportunity and security risks due to their role in market access and asset acquisition. The book seeks to identify the actors and stakeholders in the EU, and their involvement in the process of securitization – the methods and mechanisms used to transform Chinese FDI from a purely economic matter into a security issue. If views emerge of Chinese FDI as a threat, then these views will induce the transformation of FDI from an economic to a security issue, and trigger a process that facilitates the securitization of other economic interactions. While this claim may sound commonsensical and unsurprising, it is rarely substantiated in wider empirical assessments of the elements that led to the connection between Chinese foreign investment and national security.
A diverse group of European states struggled to internalize the securitization process. These states include cases where the processes were only marginally prompted by the EU’s debate (the UK), and cases where it took longer for the process to start and to conclude (the Netherlands), but overall, they share two common traits: the longstanding attachment to an ideology of open markets and competition, and the absence of a strong legal predecessor to the new regulation for FDI screening. Nonetheless, a line of difference emerges in how the process develops. In the UK, for example, the economic security discourse demonstrates a strong inclination towards protecting narrow national security interests. The pivotal role of the Dutch company ASML has been shaping the stance in the Netherlands, pushing the debate on the country’s economic security to take competitiveness into consideration and touch upon issues such as adopting policies to safeguard technological edge.
