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on Confederation of Independent States |
| By: | Vasily Astrov (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Alexandra Bykova (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Selena Duraković (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Meryem Gökten (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Richard Grieveson (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Ioannis Gutzianas (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Doris Hanzl-Weiss (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Gabor Hunya (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Branimir Jovanović (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Biljana Jovanovikj (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Niko Korpar (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Dzmitry Kruk; Isilda Mara (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Michał Możdżeń; Emilia Penkova-Pearson; Olga Pindyuk (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Sandor Richter (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Marko Sošić; Bernd Christoph Ströhm (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw); Marina Tverdostup (The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw) |
| Abstract: | CESEE faces a renewed external shock at a critical moment of structural change. The Middle East war adds inflationary pressure and uncertainty to a region already shifting away from a low-cost, export-led growth model towards one driven by investment and productivity upgrading. |
| Keywords: | CESEE Central and Eastern Europe, economic forecast, Western Balkans, CIS, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, EU, business cycle, economic sentiment, euro area, convergence, labour markets, unemployment, Russia-Ukraine war, commodity prices, inflation, price controls, trade disruptions, renewable energy, gas, electricity, monetary policy, fiscal policy |
| JEL: | E20 E21 E22 E24 E32 E5 E62 F21 F31 H60 I18 J20 J30 O47 O52 O57 P24 P27 P33 P52 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wii:fpaper:fc:spring2026 |
| By: | Mikael Elinder; Oscar Erixson; Olle Hammar |
| Abstract: | The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 reshaped geopolitics and intensified debates on how wars influence domestic political support. Media reports and scholarly work based on aggregate time-series data suggest rally effects, reflected in an immediate surge in Putin's approval ratings. Leveraging the quasi-experimental timing of the invasion relative to survey fieldwork by Levada and Gallup World Poll, we show that the invasion not only increased support for Putin but also fostered greater optimism about the future, strengthened anti-Western attitudes, and reduced migration aspirations. These effects were broadly consistent across demographic groups, with the notable exception of residents in Moscow. The mobilization, however, had the opposite effects, albeit only temporarily. Our analyses also indicate that Russians abroad have become more critical of Putin, aligning with global views. Taken together, these findings provide new evidence on autocratic leaders' use of foreign conflicts as a tool for domestic support. |
| Keywords: | War, Public opinion, Sentiments, Rally 'round the flag, Russia |
| JEL: | D72 F51 H56 P20 |
| Date: | 2026–02 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:26044 |
| By: | Gorodnichenko, Yuriy (University of California, Berkeley); Kudlyak, Marianna (Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, Hoover Institution, CEPR, IZA); Lobozynska, Sophia (Ivan Franko National University of Lviv); Skomorovych, Iryna (Ivan Franko National University of Lviv); Vladychyn, Ulyana (Ivan Franko National University of Lviv); Kovalyuk, Andriy (Ivan Franko National University of Lviv); Snovydovych, Iryna (Ivan Franko National University of Lviv) |
| Abstract: | We elicit reservation wage premia for relocating to two Ukrainian cities, using a household survey conducted in mid-April to mid-July 2024 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine: high-risk Kharkiv (near the frontline) and moderate-risk Kyiv. Risk tolerance is a strong predictor of willingness to move to Kharkiv - the most risk-averse have roughly half the odds of the most risk-tolerant - but matters much less for Kyiv. This asymmetry is difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that risk tolerance merely proxies for general mobility preferences. Separately estimating the elasticity of intertemporal substitution (EIS~0.04), we find that including it renders risk tolerance insignificant for Kyiv but not for Kharkiv - a pattern illuminated by the Epstein-Zin separation of risk aversion and the EIS: risk aversion adds predictive power only when danger is high, while the EIS operates equally for both cities as a common relocation-cost channel. The very low EIS implies that relocation incentives structured as future benefits may be ineffective; frontloaded subsidies are more likely to influence behavior. |
| Keywords: | risk preferences, elasticity of intertemporal substitution, migration, compensating differentials, Ukraine, war |
| JEL: | D15 D81 J61 R23 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18557 |
| By: | Alena Gorbuntsova; Gaurav Khanna; Sultan Mehmood |
| Abstract: | Wars are often framed as responses to external threats or shifts in the regional balance of power. Yet they can also serve domestic political ends. This paper studies how Russia’s escalations against Ukraine reshaped support for the regime and redistributed the burdens of war across the population. Combining ethnic Russian shares with election and independent polling data, we exploit two sharp geopolitical shocks, the 2014 annexation of Crimea and the 2022 full-scale invasion, in a difference-in-differences event-study design. We find that provinces with larger ethnic Russian populations exhibit sharp increases in support for President Putin following both episodes. At the same time, battlefield casualties fall disproportionately on regions with lower ethnic Russian shares, and attitudes toward the US and EU deteriorate sharply. On the Ukrainian side, Russian attacks are concentrated in areas with higher ethnic Russian shares rather than in resource-rich provinces. Explanations based on material extraction, Soviet symbolism, or differential exposure to external threats do not account for these patterns. Instead, the evidence is more consistent with ethnic identity playing a central role in the domestic political economy of the war. Our conclusions remain similar in fraud-adjusted electoral outcomes, with alternative ethnicity measures, under bounded departures from parallel trends, and after accounting for several baseline regional differences. |
| JEL: | F50 O43 P50 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35107 |
| By: | Nivievskyi, Oleh |
| Abstract: | Despite Russia’s ongoing military aggression, Ukraine has made substantial progress toward EU accession, formally launching negotiations in 2024 after obtaining candidate status in 2022 and completing the legislative screening process in 2025. Alignment with the EU acquis will require far-reaching economic and institutional transformation, particularly in agriculture, one of Ukraine’s most important and politically sensitive sectors. This paper focuses on the Common Organisation of Agricultural Markets (CMO), a central but often overlooked pillar of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy. While public debates have largely emphasized direct payments and fiscal costs of accession, the CMO plays a crucial role in shaping market regulation, competition, and trade within the EU Single Agri-Food Market. The paper analyzes the main features of the CMO, assesses implications for Ukraine’s accession process, and discusses policy options to manage adjustment pressures for both Ukraine and the EU. |
| Keywords: | Ukraine, Trade, agriculture, competitiveness, EU integration |
| JEL: | F13 F15 F51 Q17 Q18 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:128748 |
| By: | Joop Adema; Panu Poutvaara; Cevat Giray Aksoy; Yvonne Giesing |
| Abstract: | Despite rising refugee numbers worldwide, refugees' return decisions remain poorly understood. Prior work examines either intentions or realized return, but not both. We fielded a ten-wave panel of Ukrainian refugees, linking prewar home municipalities to geocoded conflict and territorial control data and eliciting war expectations. Intentions strongly predict behavior: by 2025, 42% of those planning to return soon in 2022 had returned, versus 1% of those planning to settle abroad. Increasing conflict in the home municipality reduces return there but barely affects return to Ukraine overall. More pessimistic war expectations explain 21% of the decline in return intentions. |
| Keywords: | Refugees; Return Migration; Conflict; Ukraine |
| JEL: | D74 F22 J15 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:26076 |
| By: | Tito Boeri; Giacomo Anastasia; Oleksandr Zholud |
| Abstract: | Wars disrupt labor markets, yet systematic evidence on how markets for labor services operate during conflicts is almost entirely absent. Ukraine is a rare exception: despite the full-scale Russian invasion, timely data on workers and vacancies, in both stocks and flows, remain available. We use these data to document one of the largest labor supply and reallocation shocks in recent history and to estimate the impact on job matching, showing how labor markets adapt under extreme stress. The labor force shrank by about one fourth, yet vacancy filling rates and matching efficiency declined modestly. Only along the frontline and in occupied regions there is evidence of labor market shutdowns. Wage flexibility, adaptability of recruitment policies of firms, and remote working help explain the resiliency of labor outcomes. Recovering longer-term human capital losses suffered by Ukraine will require a mix of tools going well beyond labor policies and should be a priority for the reconstruction phase. |
| Keywords: | labor supply shock, reallocation, vacancy filling rate, wartime economy |
| JEL: | J22 J23 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:26010 |
| By: | Joop Adema; Lasha Chargaziia; Yvonne Giesing; Sarah Necker; Panu Poutvaara |
| Abstract: | Refugees' decisions to return after conflict carry significant political and economic implications for the origin and host countries. We examine how conflict resolution, security, economic conditions, and corruption influence return decisions. To estimate the causal effect of post-war conditions, we conducted a single-profile conjoint experiment among 2543 Ukrainian refugees across 30 European countries. Respondents were asked how likely they would be to return to Ukraine under different hypothetical scenarios. Results show that territorial integrity and security guarantees are critical, while economic prospects and combating corruption also play an important role. Refugees planning to return are more responsive to different post-war scenarios, and younger respondents are particularly influenced by income opportunities, job prospects, and potential EU accession. Our findings suggest that targeted political and economic reconstruction policies can substantially influence post-conflict return. In the most optimistic scenario, the expected return rate is 47%; in the most pessimistic scenario, only 3%. |
| Keywords: | Refugees; Return migration; Conflict; Integration; Ukraine; Conjoint experiment |
| JEL: | F22 D74 O15 |
| Date: | 2025–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:2565 |
| By: | Robert Z. Lawrence (Peterson Institute for International Economics); Sergii Telenyk (New York University School of Law) |
| Abstract: | Key Takeaways - An FTA with the United States would help Ukraine achieve stronger investor protections, regulatory transparency, and anticorruption and dispute settlement mechanisms that anchor private investment needed to support reconstruction and sustain long-term growth. - For the United States, Ukraine offers a strategically valuable production platform: a large, skilled workforce; a legacy industrial base; and significant reserves of critical minerals, metals, and agricultural inputs needed for energy transition, defense, and supply chain resilience. - Passage of a US-Ukraine FTA in Congress could be controversial because it would bundle together some of the most contentious issues in US trade politics--agriculture, investor protection, government procurement, digital rules, and market access--into one high-salience vote. Policymakers could start by advancing more limited agreements as precursors to a comprehensive FTA. - Accession to the European Union will be the core of Ukraine's reconstruction strategy, implying that a US-Ukraine FTA should be designed to complement, rather than compete with, EU integration. Ukraine's reconstruction is often framed as a financing challenge, but the bigger challenge is institutional: Ukraine must credibly reassure domestic and foreign investors that market-oriented rules, transparent regulation, private property protection, and contract enforcement will prevail and that its territorial integrity will be secure. A free trade agreement with the United States can help Ukraine provide this assurance. |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iie:pbrief:pb26-6 |
| By: | Heiduk, Felix; Müller, Melanie; Aydın, Yaşar; Kluge, Janis; Scholz, Tobias; Stanzel, Angela; Thimm, Johannes |
| Abstract: | Multipolarity has become a central but, at the same time, highly ambiguous point of reference in debates about the future world order. The term is used descriptively, that is, to describe shifts in the distribution of power; and it is also used normatively, as an aspirational construct for a more just international order. However, as the following comparative analysis of seven countries shows, there is no coherent understanding of the term even in those countries that are pushing for multipolarity. Sharp dividing lines are evident between the United States, which has long understood the construct of multipolarity as being at odds with its strategic interests, and Russia and China, which both associate it with challenging US hegemony. However, while Russia is striving for a disruptive and violent transformation, China is aiming for an evolutionary one. Other states - above all, India and South Africa - hope that multipolarity will provide them with greater foreign-policy room for manoeuvre. And some derive their own reform proposals at the multilateral level from their understanding of the construct. Germany and the EU must rigorously examine the various interpretations and uses of the construct of multipolarity. They should not dismiss the term as irrelevant or inherently anti-Western as it can provide a common frame of reference on international politics. At the same time, its unreflective use carries risks, as the term is highly politicised and associated with what are at times the conflicting goals of a broad range of international actors. Rather than simply participating in conceptual debates, Germany and the EU should take concrete steps towards reforming the international order in policy areas such as trade, health, energy and climate. At the same time, they should regard the call for multipolarity as an indicator of the need for broad reforms of the international system and initiate negotiation processes with other states. To this end, they must first establish their own reference points with regard to the future international order so that they can identify suitable partners and institutions. |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:swprps:340177 |
| By: | Björn Brey; Joanne Haddad; Lamis Kattan |
| Abstract: | State-led repression of minority identities is a well-documented phenomenon, yet its implications for national identity remain understudied. We examine how the Soviet state-induced famine (1932-33) shapes contemporary Ukrainian national identity through vertical (familial) and horizontal (community/state) transmission. Using newly geocoded individual-level data, we find that individuals from high-famine-exposure areas are more likely to identify as Ukrainian. We document that under Soviet rule, family networks preserved identity, while church closures weakened community transmission. After independence, state-led remembrance efforts, revitalized horizontal transmission. Our findings show how repression and remembrance shape identity persistence and reflect the famine's lasting influence on Ukrainian-Russian relations. |
| Keywords: | Political Repression, National Identity, Intergenerational Transmission, Historical Memory, Trade, Conflict. |
| JEL: | D74 N44 P20 P35 Z13 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:25112 |
| By: | Grömling, Michael |
| Abstract: | Die kurzfristigen Perspektiven für die deutsche Wirtschaft waren in den vergangenen Wochen erneut von erheblichen Verunsicherungen und Risiken geprägt. Mit dem Krieg im Nahen Osten sieht sich die gesamte Weltwirtschaft mit zusätzlichen Gefahren konfrontiert. Neben den Energieproblemen im Gefolge des Krieges in der Ukraine bestehen erneute Versorgungsrisiken kombiniert mit Energiepreiseffekten auf der Erzeugerund Konsumebene. Zusätzlich entstehen Sorgen hinsichtlich der industriellen Lieferketten und der eigenen Produktionsfähigkeiten. Die nicht überwundene wirtschaftliche Krise in Deutschland zeigt sich nach wie vor in der insgesamt schlechten Geschäftslage der deutschen Unternehmen. Der Saldo aus positiven und negativen Lagebewertungen auf Basis der IW-Konjunkturumfrage vom März 2026 ist weiterhin deutlich im negativen Bereich. Nur gut 14 Prozent der Unternehmen sprechen von einer besseren Geschäftssituation als vor einem Jahr, knapp 43 Prozent von einer Verschlechterung. In der Industrie, der privaten Dienstleistungswirtschaft und in der Bauwirtschaft wird die aktuelle Lage unterm Strich negativ bewertet. Die Geschäftserwartungen der Unternehmen für das Jahr 2026 haben sich zuletzt wieder deutlich verschlechtert: Nur 21 Prozent der befragten Firmen rechnen 2026 mit einer höheren Produktion als im Vorjahr, dagegen haben 35 Prozent schlechtere Produktionserwartungen. Damit befindet sich die deutsche Wirtschaft in der längsten Phase negativer Unternehmenserwartungen seit 20 Jahren und es ist auch weiterhin kein echter Stimmungsumschwung in den deutschen Unternehmen und eine Konjunkturwende mit einer ausgeprägten Aufschwungsqualität zu erkennen. Die hohen Anpassungslasten in der deutschen Industrie durch Transformation und geopolitische Hemmnisse belasten weiterhin das Investitionsklima. Der Anteil der Industriebetriebe, die 2026 mit niedrigeren Investitionen planen, ist mit 42 Prozent nach wie vor rund doppelt so hoch wie der Anteil mit höheren Investitionen (19 Prozent). Die Erwartungswerte der privatwirtschaftlichen Dienstleister liegen auf ähnlichem Niveau und bringen die gesamte Investitionsschwäche in Deutschland klar zum Ausdruck. Über alle Branchen hinweg rechnen 21 Prozent mit höheren und 39 Prozent mit niedrigeren Investitionsbudgets im Jahr 2026. Bei den Beschäftigungserwartungen liefern alle drei großen Wirtschaftsbereiche keinen positiven Befund. Der Rückgang in der Industrie wird sich fortsetzen: 37 Prozent planen mit weniger und nur 14 Prozent der Industriefirmen mit mehr Personal. Bei den privaten Dienstleistern gehen 22 Prozent von mehr Personal, jedoch 28 Prozent von weniger Beschäftigten aus. Am weitesten ausgeglichen sind die Beschäftigungspläne in der Bauwirtschaft, wo 22 Prozent von mehr, allerdings 26 Prozent von weniger Mitarbeitern ausgehen. |
| Keywords: | Konjunktur, Unternehmensbefragung, Investitionen, Beschäftigung |
| JEL: | C82 E32 I15 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:iwkrep:340169 |