The 2024 Paris report, a collaboration of CEPR and Bruegel, takes a deep dive into Europe’s economic security challenge in the face of supply chain vulnerabilities and geopolitical shocks. Five papers examine where Europe is vulnerable and where and how it should de-risk, examining history, trade policy, import dependencies, and the economic impact of a decoupling from China. The main conclusion is that ensuring Europe’s economic security will need to go beyond diversifying sources of supply for specific goods, and include a strategy to reduce its trade integration with China, and a strategy to strengthen its single market. The report will be published in early May 2024.

The meeting will be chaired by Beatrice Weder di Mauro. Isabelle Méjean and Jean Pisani-Ferry will present their respective chapters of the report, followed by comments and discussion.

 

Presenters

Isabelle Méjean is Professor of Economics at Sciences Po, Paris and a Research Fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy and Research (CEPR). Among her editorial duties, she is the Managing Editor of Economic Policy as of October 2021 (and just completed a mandate as the Co-Editor of the European Economic Review). She is a member of the Conseil d’Analyse Économique since 2020 as well as Member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the Kiel Institute.

Isabelle Méjean’s research interests span international macroeconomics and international trade. She is particularly interested in the structure of firm-to-firm trade networks and its consequences for various aggregate outcomes. She publishes regularly in the top peer-reviewed international journals such as the American Economic Review, Econometrica, Journal of International Economics, the Journal of Urban Economics, and the American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics.

 

Jean Pisani-Ferry is a Senior Fellow at Bruegel, the European think tank, a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute (Washington DC) and Special Advisor and Distinguished Fellow of CEPR. He teaches at Sciences Po (Paris) and serves as non-executive chair of I4CE, the French institute for climate economics. His current research focuses on the economic impact of climate action, a topic on which he submitted in May 2023 a report to the French Prime Minister, on European economic policy issues, and on international collective action.

Pisani-Ferry served from 2013 to 2016 as Commissioner-General of France Stratégie, the ideas lab of the French government. In 2017, he contributed to Emmanuel Macron’s presidential bid as the Director of programme and ideas of his campaign. He was from 2005 to 2013 the Founding Director of Bruegel, the Brussels-based economic think tank. Beforehand, he was Executive President of the French PM’s Council of Economic Analysis (2001-2002), Senior Economic Adviser to the French Minister of Finance (1997-2000), and Director of CEPII, the French institute for international economics (1992-1997).

 

Discussant

Jean-Noël Barrot is the French Minister for European Affairs since february 2024, after leaving his position as Minister for Digital Affairs, which he held from 2022 to 2024.  Prior to joining the government, Barrot represented the 2nd constituency of the Yvelines department in the National Assembly from 2017 to 2022 where he also held the position of Vice-Chairman of the Finance Committee of the National Assembly. Jean-Noël Barrot is an economist. 

 

From 2013 to 2017, he was a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), before being appointed professor at HEC Paris. His research focuses on finance, production networks, and the evaluation of business support public policies. He graduated from HEC Paris, holds masters from the Paris School of Economics, HEC and Sciences-Po, as well as a Ph.D. obtained at HEC Paris.

Jean-Noël Barrot belongs to the Mouvement Démocrate (MoDem) where he served as national spokesperson (2018), then as secretary general (2018-2022) and finally as vice president (since July 2022).

Born on May 13, 1983, in Paris, Jean-Noël Barrot is a laureate of the French-American Foundation's "Young Leaders" program (class of 2020). His work has been published in leading international such as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Journal of Finance, the Journal of Financial Economics and Management Science.

 

Chair

Beatrice Weder di Mauro is the President of CEPR, Professor of International Economics at the Geneva Graduate Institute and Distinguished Fellow of the Hoffmann Global Institute for Business and Society at INSEAD in France.

Previously, she was reserach professor at INSEAD Singapore and professor at the Gutenberg University of Mainz. From 2004 to 2012, she was a member on the German Council of Economic Experts.

She regularly serves as advisor to governments, international organizations and central banks and has extensive experience as independent director on the board of leading global companies, including Roche, UBS and Tyssen-Krupp. Currently, she sits on the board of Unigestion and Bosch. Her research interests are in international macroeconomics, financial crisis and climate finance.