Revista de Economie Mondiala/ Journal of Global Economics

5-36

Authors: Ana-Cristina Bâlgăr, Sarmiza Pencea

Since the Cold War, German foreign policy has been guided by the classical liberal concept of “change through trade” as a catalyst for integrating into the global economy, leading to prosperity, peace and political liberalism. This axiomatic principle has been at the heart of establishing and deepening the economic relations between Germany and China, coming to govern the mutually beneficial partnership of the two states for several decades. Nevertheless, a series of measures and actions undertaken by the Chinese government in recent years have led to the cooling of bilateral ties and prompted the German authorities to decide to develop a new foreign policy strategy, focused on reducing the economic dependence on this country with diverging political interests. To better understand the reasons behind the current paradigm shift, our article takes a historical look at the evolution of German policy towards China, seeking to identify the main determinants and particularities of each of the successive stages that have unfolded from the times when the mutual interdependence of the two began to develop, to the current phase, that calls for extensive policy readjustment.

52-64

Authors: Cristian Moisoiu

Since the 2000s, the European Union has proclaimed itself a forerunner of climate change mitigation and adaptation policies. The EU has adopted extremely ambitious targets and objectives ever since, with a view to accomplishing its transformation into a low-carbon economy. In the current context of instability and crisis, the climate policies and the structural reform decisions, mainly in the energy and manufacturing sectors, seem to bear on the international competitiveness of the European economy and on the living standards of a large number of the European citizens. From another perspective, the wave of crises that hit the European economy might be interpreted as a window of opportunity for the governments and businesses to promote innovative solutions in order to leapfrog from energy intensive industries towards more performant, higher value-adding ones. The present article will expound the EU low-carbon economy model and the main policies it suggested, as well as the challenges and risks that occur in this tense context.

5-39

Authors: Sarmiza Pencea

Semiconductors or (micro)chips are the most complex, sophisticated, knowledge-loaded and amazing in terms of their performances, technological accomplishment ever attained by mankind. Both the current and the future technological civilization are rendered infeasible without these components essential for any modern device, while globally, any hierarchies established between the great powers already are and will increasingly become dependent on their capacity of designing and producing microchips. This paper offers in its first chapters the information strictly needed to understand the language of the field, what these components are and how they are produced, and then it analyzes the global semiconductors industry with the typical ecosystem of the companies involved and its peculiar organizational way. The research proceeds further to the analysis of the Chinese microchip industry, its development gap versus market leaders, its technological war with the USA, Taiwan’s strategic place in the world’s chip industry, as well as of China’s challenges, ambitions and risks encountered in its endeavor to take over the global semiconductor’s market leadership.

60-76

Authors: Andreea - Emanuela Drăgoi, Anca - Cătălina Dragomir

In the current international economic environment, shaped by the consequences of the war in Ukraine and by the global effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the issue of "clean"/”green” energy is a constant concern for both the states with advanced economies and for those with emerging economies. China, one of the fastest growing economies, has set out to become a world leader in this field, hence within its "Made in China 2025" Strategy the development of renewable energies occupies a central place. Taking into consideration all the mentioned factors, the purpose of this research is to highlight the place and role of nuclear energy in the mix of “green” energies in China, while also emphasizing the premises of the technological advance registered by the Chinese nuclear industry. Our article underlines both the challenges for the development of Chinese nuclear industry and the remarkable progress made in recent years, presenting, through a comparative analysis, China's position in the ranking of current nuclear powers, but also the main goals of the Chinese authorities regarding the development of nuclear energy and increasing its role in the national energy mix.

90-104

Authors: Octavian Șerban

The COVID-19 sanitary crisis has triggered a series of turbulences in the market, with adverse effects on the economic and social life at global level. Under the circumstances, productivity and competitiveness suffered, and governments had to revitalize economies by rethinking the circuit of resources reallocations to the sectors and fields of activity strongly affected by the crisis. In order to avoid any distortion of competition and inappropriate use of the productivity concept, governments must establish a set of measures that identify the sectors, fields, or economic entities able to perform well under normal circumstances, but having productivity and competitiveness levels dramatically declining under the adverse efects of the crisis. In this article, we try to find the proper approach of a fair resources reallocation to overcome the adverse effects of the sanitary crisis at the global level, starting with adaptating the theory of "creative destruction" to the new context and elaborating the concept of "collaborative complementarity".

5-22

Authors: Virginia Câmpeanu

Successive reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) have led to increasingly shifting of agriculture towards the market, while integrating environmental protection requirements and strengthening support for rural development in all the Member States of the European Union. This article aims to present the results of our research on a) dynamic of the "greening" process in the rural area of the European Union to combat climate change; b) the funding mechanisms for the programs implementation and greening payments to farmers, revealing some critical considerations on how greening and agro -environmental measures were applied into the EU rural area in 2014-2020 and c) the perspectives of the greening process by 2021-2027, as well as the financial allocations in the new Multiannual Financial Framework. The results confirm the European Commission's ambitions regarding the Community's rural area in the context of the European Green Deal and the measures initiated under the European Recovery and Resilience Plan, in order to promptly overcome the health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

48-65

Authors: Ana-Cristina Bâlgăr

Recognizing from an early stage the ability of advanced technologies (and of biotechnology, in particular) to fundamentally change the economy, geopolitics and society of the 21st century, the Chinese authorities have placed the development of the biotech sector as one of their top national priorities and, therefore, have adopted political strategies and programmes designed to contribute to achieving this purpose In the context of "Made in China 2025" strategy which, among other objectives, sets China's goal of becoming the world leader in life sciences and of reducing its domestic technological dependence on foreigners, our article aims at presenting the evolution of China's investment policy in recent years, which has focused on finding a synergistic optimum between guiding foreign direct investment inflows (FDI) in accordance with its own sectoral upgrading plans and directing outward direct investment flows (ODI) in line with the same interests. As the US is the world leader in biotechnology and thus China's main competitor in the race for global supremacy in the field, our analysis will focus on highlighting the role and importance played by Sino-US bilateral investment flows for the development of the Chinese biotechnology sector.

82-94

Authors: Sorin-Nicolae Curcă

Currently, China has the largest high-speed rail network and one of the most important industries in this field worldwide. That is a great performance, considering the relatively short time it needed for the industry's development and for reaching such high rankings. In this paper we analyze these issues, we look at the reasons why Beijing authorities chose to stimulate the development of the high-speed train industry and transport and how was this achieved. We also consider the implications of the high-speed rail industry for china in terms of the international relations.

renewable energy, subsidies, CEE-4, Green Deal

Authors: Paul Calanter, Andreea - Emanuela Drăgoi, Anca - Cătălina Dragomir

Renewable energy (RE) is one of the Green Deal strategic pillars and progress in this area is deemed essential to achieving the objectives of the Energy Union by 2030. In this context, our analysis aims at highlighting the progress attained in green energy development by four EU Member States in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE-4): the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Romania. The main objective of our research is to carry out a comparative analysis of four key indicators (RE share in the total energy used, in the total electricity consumption, in heating and cooling and in transports), in their evolution during the post-accessiontime-frame (2004-2019). Our analysis relies on both a case study (Romania) and a comparative stock-taking of the RE support policies and subsidies schemes used in all the four countries. Our paper will also present, through a SWOT analysis, Romania's progress in terms of its RE support policies and schemes, while highlighting significant differences as compared to the other CEE-4 countries.

49-62

Authors: Claudia Gabriela Baicu

Trade finance contributes to the development and facilitation of trade flows and can support increased the competitiveness of goods and services. This role is even more relevant in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, when access to financing has become crucial for trade recovery. Against this background, the article investigates policies and techniques for trade finance under the impact of increasing competition,changes in the evolution of global value chains, tightening banking regulations in the field, increasing protectionism and the imperative of digitalisation. The results of the research reveal that traditional financing products are increasingly less used in favour of open account and the affirmation of new, emerging techniques. One imperative is the digitalisation of trade finance, which, in addition to opportunities, presents some risks and challenges that need to be correctly identified and managed.

3-10

Authors: Florin Bonciu

The process of globalization has passed through several stages since the end of the Second World War. This paper focuses on the period 1980-2020, and identifies a number of factors of influence that have led to the differentiation of 3 subperiods, i.e.: (1) 1980-2008: a subperiod of dynamic evolution and maturity of globalization; (2) 2008-2016: a subperiod of differentiation among players in the world economy and of erosion of the existing world order; and (3) 2016-2020: a subperiod of transition towards a new world order and a new type of globalization. During this last 2016-2020 subperiod, several trends and phenomena have been at work in outlinig the beginning of a moment of discontinuity. The conclusion is that globalization entered after 2016, and particularly after the Covid-19 crisis, into a new stage, with new characteristics that require both awareness nationally and cooperation internationally.

29-48

Authors: Cristian Moisoiu

Information and communication technologies (ICT) remain one of the top industries in the world economy, providing high value added, high-tech and showing potential to decide the future winners of the technological race on the global scene. During the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and the associated crisis, the IT industry continued to grow dramatically and provide technical solutions to make traditional industries in lockdown work further, but also digital solutions for vital services, like local governance, education or shopping. Regardless of the evolution of the pandemic and the way out of the crisis, the high-tech tools will determine the future of the world economy. Thus, both the opportunities and risks are being analysed from the perspective of the world economic powers. Among these, the three main economic blocks that have a word to say in this global competition for digitalisation are the USA, China and the EU, each trying to acquire the most competitive advantages in order to win the current race.

62-78

Authors: Claudia Gabriela Baicu

Increasing the level of financial inclusion is a priority on the European Union's agenda. Against this backdrop, our paper presents the experience of six European countries – namely, France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Poland and Ireland – in promoting financial inclusion. For this purpose, the following aspects have been taken into account: (1) relevant legislative measures aimed at ensuring the financial inclusion of the population and companies; (2) good practices for increasing financial inclusion; and (3) actions to improve financial education undertaken by central banks or other representative financial institutions in those countries. The results of our analysis reveal that these countries are deploying efforts to increase financial inclusion, but there are some peculiarities in addressing this topic. However, the most important initiatives to improve financial inclusion in these countries include: guaranteeing access to a basic payment account, facilitating the access of the population and companies to microfinance, and developing financial education programs.