The European Defence Industry. A Comparative Analysis of the European Defence Technological and Industrial Base

The analysis on the European defence industry is valuable in many respects. First of all, under a pure strategic and military point of view, there is a growing necessity for the European Union to rely on its own capabilities in order to face mounting international threats, particularly in its neighbourhood. Second, under an economic standpoint, the defence industry has been shown to be very important in terms of productivity and spill-overs effects for the all economy. Finally, the defence industry is at the basis of the concept of the modern state: the capability of independence, effectiveness and the legitimate use of force are among the basic prerogatives of modern national states. Following the example of Keith Hartley in "The Economic of Defence Policy", the United States of America has been chosen as a reliable benchmark to assess the performance of the overall European defence industry. The Structure-Conduct-Performance model has been preferred for the analysis because of the data available to the author as well as of comparability needs with the previous literature. Eventually, from the present study, it has been possible to gauge some important conclusions as of the main shortcomings and opportunities of the European defence technological and industrial base.