THE LISBON STRATEGY AT MID-TERM: PRESENT ACHIEVEMENTS AND FURTHER EXPECTATIONS

Abstract: Directing European economies to new paths of development by closing the economic gap between Europe and the Unites States and advancing ahead of the USA until 2010, was the backbone of the Lisbon Strategy’s success, launched by the EU in 2000. This Strategy was designed to increase the growth and modernize Europe, while caring for sustainable development and social cohesion. In March 2000, at the outset of their Summit in Lisbon, leaders of the European Union1 pledged to transform the EU into the “most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world ” by 2010. The Lisbon Strategy was designed to increase the growth and modernize Europe, while caring for sustainable development and social cohesion. The Strategy represented an innovative approach to development because economic objectives were not juxtaposed with social ones. Instead, the Strategy endeavored to demonstrate that economic and social objectives are intertwined and the implementation the economic objectives might feed-back support and strength to the social objectives, and vice versa. Directing European economies to new paths of development was the backbone of th