Future of the European Union

Abstract

Long-term processes of the social economic development of the European Union are discussed. Possibilities for the development of new forms of economic, social and . technological headway designed to create and further improve economies based on knowledge are analyzed. The main emphasis is on national and regional economic specialization and creation of new networks of clusters. Clusterization oriented towards an increase of efficiency of various national and regional economies is a critical precondition for a successful creation of modern economy based on knowledge, both in the whole space of the European Union and particular countries. A concept of the creation of regional and cross-regional clusters and their networks also known as "economic oazes" is proposed here. It is explained that in the economies based on knowledge the development of clusters and their networks will soon become one of the core forms of economic and technological advancement. Further on, a variety of clusters and their networks is defined, and an idea of clusterization generally oriented towards the ereation and promotion of high technologies is given. In addition, some typical factors of the economic and social development of the European Union are being described here, and it has been subsequently proved that these factors reflect the common context of the creation of knowledge - based economies. Undersdtanding of these factors allows us to consequently implement strategies of two types that could create economies based on knowledge: first, these are strategies oriented towards integration of the processes of economic and social development, along with strategies oriented towards the syntesis of tire results of economic endeavours and technology advancement of different origins.