This study examines the causal links between improvements in economic freedom and changes in GDP per capita of new EU members in transition in the period 2000‒2009. The empirical results suggest significant causality running from changes in monetary and fiscal freedom, trade openness, regulation of credit, labour, and business, legal structure and security of property rights, and access to sound money to movements in GDP per capita, especially in less and moderately developed CEE transition countries. Moreover, we find evidence that improvements in economic freedom are one of the main factors stimulating the convergence of these economies towards rich EU members. The evidence of causality in the opposite direction is much weaker.

In this study, effects of political stability, economic freedom and trade freedom of above-stated Fragile Five Countries consisting of Brazil, Indonesia,India, Turkey, and South Africa on the performance of FDI appeal was analyzed with first generation panel data analysis method for the 1996-2017 period. The cointegration analysis between series was conducted by means of Kao (1999) and Pedroni (2004) test. The analyses showed that political stability and trade freedom have a significant positive coefficient on the Fragile Five Countries’FDI. It was also determined that the impact of economic freedom on FDI was statistically insignificant. Thus, it was concluded that the most important determinant of FDI entry into countries is political stability. Error correction mechanisms of models have been working well. In addition, it was found that political stability, economic freedom, and trade freedom are the cause of foreign direct investment in the long-run.