An EU Geoeconomic Competition Policy: the Case of the Important Projects of Common European Interest (IPCEI)

It is widely recognized that the European Union (EU) is poised to position itself in a new geoeconomic environment, stricken by deteriorating conditions to global trade and investment, the delusion of multilateralism and growing disturbances to the globalized economy. Additionally, the EU’s main partners/rivals are increasingly using their economies to shape international relations, as well as regional and global regulatory structures. In this context, the EU is striving to leverage its assets and mitigate its vulnerabilities, not least by reinforcing its strategic autonomy in critical areas, such as energy, foreign investment, critical raw materials, industrial strategy or competition policy. In this paper, we propose to explore how European Policies, namely Competition Policy, are adapting to the new geoeconomic and geopolitical environment, especially vis a vis the EU’s main competitors, such as the USA or China. European policies are often criticized for not evolving into the current context of increasing protectionism and the continuous dispute for technological primacy. Critics argue that EU policies must be proactive in enhancing EU firms’ competitiveness in cutting-edge sectors and preventing member states' economies from being taken over by aggressive foreign companies in strategic areas. Political and economic leaders in several member states have also been complaining about an orthodox regulatory framework that prevents European companies from gaining scale to strive in global markets while alerting to the urge to reinforce economic security. In this context, our research questions aim at: 1. Understanding if Competition Policy is evolving into a new regulatory framework, specifically the framework of state aid policies related to major research and innovation projects, with a special focus on IPCEI (Important Projects of Common European Interest). 2. Assessing whether those IPCEI are in line to tackle the vulnerabilities identified by the Draghi Report on the Future of European Competitiveness, namely the lagging performance of European companies in the digital revolution and meagre productivity gains vis a vis direct competitors. We develop our research using a qualitative approach, focused on content and discourse analysis. We focus on primary and secondary sources, such as official documents from the EU, political speeches of member state leaders, and the IPCE database of approved and prospective projects.