Determinants of FDI location across European Countries: role of economic and non-economic factors in decision-making by means of econometric analysis of panel data for 1995-2010

This thesis provides an insight into factors that determine FDI inflows. Our focus is on FDI inflows directed to European countries and we study the FDI phenomena both from theoretical and practical view. We extend the literature that highlights the importance of FDI- institution link, and hypothesise that countries with better institutional quality should attract more foreign direct investments. This is in accord with expectation that good institutions create better investment environment in terms of lower costs of doing business and lower risk. The main purpose of this thesis is to complement previous studies that have covered this topic, but did not account for years of financial crisis. The key part analyses panel data for 33 European economies in the period from 1995 to 2010. A model of FDI determinants is constructed and estimated using panel data estimation techniques. The empirical part has revealed that even though some of the institutional variables are significant, they remain rather additional in explaining FDI flows; whereas the traditional economic variables are clearly significant. Our results are intuitively consistent with theoretical expectations and show that market growth, low trade restrictions, good infrastructure and low labour costs are key FDI drivers. Other important..