Free movement of foreign investment in the European Union in times of COVID-19
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Abstract
International investment flows have grown steadily since 1990, among a global acceptance of their benefits. However, this situation is changing sharply. Globalization and foreign investment are under siege, and a more cautious approach to both of them is ascertainable in many places. Among other consequences, this leads to the enactment of more restrictive regulations towards them.
The European Union is an economically integrated space, extremely open to foreign investment. Since 2009, the Common Commercial Policy embodies foreign direct investment. Nevertheless, the consolidation of this new policy coexists with the development of screening mechanisms of foreign investment on national security grounds. Some European countries have developed them, and the European Union, itself, also enacted a Regulation on this topic in March 2019.
The Covid-19 pandemic, with its devastating economic and social effects, introduces an additional element of tension in this topic in the eu. The need to preserve strategic sectors of the European economy collides with the principle of free movement of foreign investment that has characterized the Union since its inception, raising doubts and premonitions about the future to come on this area… A future, that, perhaps, is already here.
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