EU governance and EU funds – testing the effectiveness of EU funds in a sound macroeconomic framework

The objective of this paper is to empirically analyse whether sound fiscal and macroeconomic policies are beneficial to the achievement of the socio-economic development objectives enshrined in the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, and in particular whether sound policies have an impact on the effectiveness of European Structural and Investment Funds (ESI funds) in helping Member States to progress towards these socio-economic development objectives.

Our econometric results show that sound fiscal policies proxied by low levels of government debt and deficit and sound macroeconomic policies proxied by low levels of net foreign liabilities are beneficial to socio-economic development. Furthermore, we find evidence that ESI funds are effective in helping Member States to enhance socio-economic development and this effectiveness is higher when combined with sound national fiscal and macroeconomic policies.