Publications

Sustainability rules are not a block on EU defence financing, but reputational fears are

To mobilise private capital for weapons, the European Commission should clarify the status of defence investing in its sustainable finance framework

Silvia Merler

Reinforcing EU merger control against the risks of acquisitions by big tech

The burden of proving that a merger is not anti-competitive should be shifted onto gatekeepers

Mario Mariniello

Ukraine: European democracy’s affordable arsenal

A future enlarged EU, including Ukraine, should take full advantage of the lower-cost military production capabilities of Ukraine

Jacob Funk Kirkegaard

Thinking European first and its implications

Faced with heightened geopolitical uncertainty, the European Union should base its actions on an overarching principle of ‘thinking European first’

Kalin Anev Janse, Roel Beetsma, Marco Buti and Catherine de Vries

Can Germany afford to take most defence spending out of its debt brake?

Higher German defence spending would be fiscally sustainable, but would require cuts elsewhere and would breach EU fiscal rules

Jeromin Zettelmeyer

Transatlantic clean investment monitor 3: battery manufacturing

Battery manufacturing investment is rising fast on both sides of the Atlantic with the US outstripping Europe – for now

Marie Jugé, Ugnė Keliauskaitė, Kate Larsen, Charlotte McClintock, Ben McWilliams, Hannah Pitt, Simone Tagliapietra, Harold Tavarez and Cecilia Trasi

Will China’s economy follow the same path as Japan’s?

Since the 2021 bursting of its real-estate bubble, worries have grown that China's future economic trajectory will mirror that of Japan in the 1990s

Alicia García-Herrero and Jianwei Xu

'Reciprocal' tariffs: what's in a word?

Trump's definition does not reflect reciprocity as applied in past multilateral trade negotiations or in equality of tariffs

Petros C. Mavroidis

Greening the EU budget: why climate mainstreaming needs reform

The EU’s climate mainstreaming framework suffers from design flaws and complexity, risks greenwashing and does not detect harmful activities

Zsolt Darvas and Kamil Sekut

Europeans still want climate action, but don't trust governments to deliver

Despite recent election results, underlying concern about climate change has not changed significantly

Jan Eichhorn and Heather Grabbe

Gender diversity and economic growth

The gains from gender inclusiveness are likely to be much larger than standard economic models estimate

Jonathan Ostry

Clean industrial transformation: where does Europe stand?

Clean-tech investment and employment in the EU are growing, but a major heavy industry decarbonisation push is still needed

Marie Jugé, Ugnė Keliauskaitė, Ben McWilliams, Simone Tagliapietra and Cecilia Trasi

Defending Europe without the US: first estimates of what is needed

Europe could need 300,000 more troops and an annual defence spending hike of at least €250 billion in the short term to deter Russian aggression

Alexandr Burilkov and Guntram B. Wolff

Europe’s energy information problem

Choices are needed about responsibilities at European and national levels, expanding existing institutions or creating new independent ones

Ben McWilliams, Simone Tagliapietra and Georg Zachmann

The European Union’s new fiscal framework: a good start, but challenges loom

Nicolas Boivin and Zsolt Darvas

How to improve the European Union’s sustainable finance framework

Five adjustments would make the EU sustainable finance framework more effective at delivering the desired alignment of incentives

Silvia Merler