체제전환국 외국인직접투자(FDI) 유입 결정요인에 관한 연구: 비세그라드(Visegrad) 국가를 중심으로

Abstract

As the Soviet Union and the socialist countries in eastern Europe collapsed in the early 1990s, there was a shift from a Soviet command economy to a free market economy. In line with this change, there was also a growing interest in how these changes affected the economic development of these transition economies. In particular, many studies on the increase of FDI inflow and its determinants have been conducted since then. This study analyzed the determinants of FDI into the four nations of the Visegrad (hereinafter Visegrad 4), using bilateral panel data from EU 24 countries investing in Visegrad 4 from 1995 to 2012. The empirical analysis is based on the economic factors in the gravity model, and the governance indices, the economic liberalization index, and the transition indicators are sequentially considered to analyze the determinants of FDI in Visegrad 4. The findings of the analysis are summarized as follows: First, the basic gravity model parameters are directly proportional to the size of GDP of trading partners and inversely proportional to distance. In other words, the larger the GDP of the EU 24 countries and Visegrad 4, the greater the FDI inflow, and the greater the distance between the two, the smaller the FDI inflow. Second, when economic variables such as GDP per capita, real effective exchange rate, and trade volume out of GDP were added, all three variables were statistically relevant at 1% significance level. This indicates that as the currency value of the Visegrad 4 declines, the larger the trade volume, the more FDI inflows can be stimulated, but the GDP per capita indicates (-) value at 1% significance level. It seems to have played the role of production base for European and other third countries' market entry, rather than expanding host countries’ market through FDI. Third, the governance indices of the World Bank showed statistically significant in the variables of regulatory quality, rule of law, and voice and accountability. The higher the quality of regulation that can promote the development of the private sector, the higher the level of citizens' compliance with the law, the stronger the system of the rule of law, the higher the level of citizen's right to vote including freedom of speech, assembly, and expression, the more possibilities of attracting FDI. Fourth, the economic liberalization index of the Heritage Foundation and the transition indicators of the EBRD showed statistically significant in terms of property rights or ownership protection, and transition index. This implies that the greater the degree of protection of property rights, and the greater the convergence of transition to the market economy, the greater the likelihood of FDI inflow. The findings of the empirical analysis are consistent with the results of previous studies, showing that the determinants of FDI inflows in advanced economies are mainly economic factors, but in the case of developing and transition economies, they are directly affected by political and institutional factors as well as economic ones.