EUROPE 2020 STRATEGY AND ITS IMPLEMENTATION IN VISEGRAD GROUP COUNTRIES

Europe 2020 Strategy can be seen as an answer of the European Union to challenges resulting from both global crisis 2008+ and internal structural weaknesses of the EU. It focuses on three priorities, namely: smart growth, sustainable growth and inclusive growth. All EU Member States have been obliged to undertake necessary actions and activities in order to achieve higher levels of employment, productivity and social cohesion. The main objective of the paper is to study and analyse Europe 2020 Strategy and its implementation in Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. The national targets for V4 economies in the fields of employment, innovation, education, social inclusion and climate/energy have been compared to the objectives set on the EU level. The so far implementation of the Strategy in V4 economies has been presented. An attempt has been made to list strengths and weaknesses of the analysed economies in respect to the Strategy. In addition to that changes in competitiveness (competitive position) of the V4 countries have been described.