The electric power sector is facing comprehensive changes reflected in the reorganization of the entire market, in the economic relations management and the technical and technological functioning of companies. The changes are in fact a consequence of various restructuring processes in the electric power sector, which are parallelly unfolding depending on the course and dynamics of the structural reforms implementation. In the electric power industry, these processes primarily involve liberalization, namely, opening the market to all business entities, and thus introducing competition to the electricity power market. The establishment of competition in the electric power industry is facilitated by the process of vertical unbundling of electric power activities, which can be divided into market-oriented and regulated activities. The purpose of this paper is to present the structural reforms and processes of restructuring the electric power industry which is transforming from monopoly market structures to competitive market conditions.
The process of the United Kingdom (UK) leaving the European Union, as a result of the 2016 referendum, brings a lot of uncertainties regarding the impacts of new regulations of trade relations between the UK and other EU member states as well as other countries worldwide. The purpose of this research is, based on a review of the UK's history as an EU member, and the analyses of its current international trade, to determine the potential effects of the process of the UK leaving the European Union to its future trade with the rest of the world. In this paper, four different models by which further trade relations between the United Kingdom and EU could be regulated are discussed. Each of these models has its advantages and disadvantages, and it is not possible to determine with certainty which one of them would be the most beneficial for the UK. Even though a large number of UK's trade partners are not EU members, it is evident that the trade with other countries worldwide can easily be a subjected to change. For that reason, the United Kingdom should primarily base its trade on relations with EU member states, with the assumption of further cooperation with other counties.
Liberalization of the world economy is a powerful and dynamic process characterized by the abolition and/or reduction of customs restrictions, which results in static and dynamic impacts that largely determine a country's position in global trade relations. The process of liberalization also enables technology transfer and the exchange of other forms of investments in research and development 'outcomes', which represent the foundations of achieving a long-term economic growth and competitiveness in the modern business environment. However, the success of countries or integrations in such conditions is largely determined by the ability to adapt and to absorb positive effects of the liberalization process. The research problem in this paper arises from the potentially negative effects of trade liberalization, especially on the loss of competitiveness of the European economy, which was mainly established through technological progress in the previous decades. The conducted research is based on the scientific hypothesis: it is possible to determine the effects of liberalization of international trade, as well as the trade agreements that the EU concludes with third countries, on the technological progress of the European economy. With the profound 'insight' into the relevant literature, the authors of this paper found that most of economic theorists have so far dealt with the effects of globalization and related processes of increased levels of technological readiness on trade liberalization. In this paper an inverse approach was used in order to investigate the effects of the removal of trade barriers on achieving the technological progress of the European economy. This approach represents the fundamental scientific contribution of the conducted research. The results showed that the EU has, in the past sixteen years, along with a few rounds of enlargements, basically doubled its international trade, achieving almost constant surplus of the foreign trade balance. Also, together with the growth of international trade, an orientation of the European economy toward modern 'engines of growth', particularly based on investments in research and development and their outcomes is noticeable. In the observed period, the EU achieved increased levels of: 1) investments in R&D, 2) sales of high technology products, 3) international trade of high technology products, and 4) employment in high technology sectors. The pressure of global competition and demographic changes, which can greatly slow down economic growth and innovation activities of the European economy because of their adverse effects, are recognized as the most important challenges for the EU in the future process of trade liberalization (or de-liberalization) and the achievement of technological progress.
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