European differentiated integration and capitalism in a comparative perspective

This chapter follows the logic of the national case studies, elaborated in the previous four chapters, in which the authors analysed, in the first instance, a country’s development of its integratory path with Europe and then put it in the evolution of its capitalism-type context. However, in this section, they compare the four countries of Germany, Poland, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, and, to do so, apply more formalized indices representing differentiation (the degree of integration with the EU) and the variety of capitalism (the dominant coordination mechanisms). The authors eventually sketch the dynamic, core-periphery model of European integration and capitalism involving the shifts that occurred in these two dimensions over last three decades.