CEsA/ISEG Research Working Paper No. 206/2025 proposes a model to understand the dependency among actors involved in the European Union’s Global Gateway strategy
The CEsA/ISEG Research Working Paper No. 206/2025, entitled Multiplexing Corporate Power: Navigating corporate autonomy in the EU Global Gateway, presents the conceptual framework of “geoeconomic force multiplexing”, which explains how corporations process public inputs across geographical, sectoral, temporal, and network dimensions.
The dynamics of dependency between corporations and the various actors involved in the European Union’s Global Gateway initiative, as well as the impact of these relations on achieving geoeconomic objectives, are the focus of the new CEsA/ISEG Research Working Paper No. 206/2025, entitled Multiplexing Corporate Power: Navigating corporate autonomy in the EU Global Gateway.
Authored by Luís Pais Bernardo, researcher at CEsA/ISEG Research, the study analyses three flagship projects — the Lobito Corridor (Angola), Dakar BRT (Senegal), and Lumut Maritime Industrial City (Malaysia) — through which it develops an innovative conceptual framework explaining how corporations process public inputs across multiple dimensions: geographical, sectoral, temporal, and network.
Based on these interactions, the author identifies four “multiplexer profiles”: autonomous (high leverage, low dependence), directed (high leverage, high dependence), bounded (low leverage, high dependence), and opportunistic (low leverage, low dependence). The study further demonstrates that, by delegating the implementation of the initiative to corporate actors, the EU creates path-dependent lock-ins that may redirect or undermine the original objectives of the Global Gateway.
The Working Paper No. 206/2025 is available for download here https://cesa.rc.iseg.ulisboa.pt/publicacoes/working-paper-206-2025-multiplexing-corporate-power-navigating-corporate-autonomy-in-the-eu-global-gateway/
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Abstract:
The EU’s Global Gateway initiative relies on corporations to achieve geoeconomic goals, creating structural dependence on actors with autonomous transformation capacity. By analyzing official documents and three flagship projects (Lobito Corridor (Angola), Dakar BRT (Senegal), and Lumut Maritime Industrial City (Malaysia)) I develop a “geoeconomic force multiplexing” framework explaining how corporations process public inputs across geographic, sectoral, temporal, and network dimensions. Four “multiplexer profiles” emerge from the interaction of leverage and patron dependence: autonomous (high leverage, low dependence), directed (high leverage, high dependence), bounded (low leverage, high dependence), and opportunistic (low leverage, low dependence). The EU faces inherent tension: channeling priorities through high-leverage corporations invites lower steerability, while more dependent actors lack transformative capacity. Delegating implementation to corporate actors creates path-dependent lock-ins that may redirect or undermine original objectives.
About the author:
Luís Pais Bernardo is an associate researcher at CEsA/ISEG Research. He works in the areas of Social Sciences with an emphasis on Political Science.
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Author: CEsA Communication Team (comunicacao@cesa.iseg.ulisboa.pt)
Image: Reproduction
