Narystės Europos Sąjungoje įtaka MTEP investicijoms centrinėje ir rytų Europoje ; The effect of European Union membership on R&D growth in central and eastern European countries

In the beginning of the 21st century, the European Union identified more intense R&D as one of the core strategic goals. At the very same time, two enlargements of the EU took place, involving to the union countries from Central and Eastern Europe, which at the time of the accession were lagging behind in terms of economic prosperity. Also, R&D related activities were the ones, where the biggest gap between CEE countries and the old member states existed. This paper concentrates on 3 different R&D related factors, namely, R&D inputs, human capital accumulation in R&D and R&D outputs. Academic sources have different views regarding role of the EU membership on R&D related factors in CEE countries. On one hand, economic and political integration should have helped CEE countries to converge and catch up older member states, on the other hand, as regional innovation paradox and brain drain theories state, the effect of the EU on R&D factors should be insignificant. I raise three hypotheses and argue that (1) R&D inputs would have been lower, (2) human capital accumulation in R&D would not be different, and (3) R&D outputs would not be different if CEE countries would not have joined the EU in 2004 and 2007. Empirical research is executed by using synthetic control method. The empirical tests suggest that the EU had a significant effect only on three countries regarding R&D inputs and human capital accumulation. However, I have failed to reject third hypothesis, as synthetic control method do not show significance of the EU in terms of R&D outputs in CEE countries