As countries in the European Union struggle to comply with the Maastricht Treaty, the question of monetary integration is at the forefront of European politics. This book explores how and why Germany--whose economic power makes it a pivotal player--has developed inconsistent policies toward European monetary institutions and how these institutions affect domestic politics and state policies toward the institutions.

Tracing the forty-year history of negotiations to construct exchange rate regimes in the European Union, Money and Power in Europe emphasizes the role of a state's bargaining power for the formation of rules. In contrast to the prevailing literature's emphasis on domestic factors like sectoral and partisan interests, policy ideas and domestic institutional structures, Matthias Kaelberer highlights the structural conflict of interest between weak and strong currency countries over the rules of monetary cooperation. Strong currency countries, in particular Germany, because they do not face a reserve constraint, are in a position to shape the rules of monetary regimes decidedly in their favor, including the refusal to compromise on rules of domestic macroeconomic adjustment.

Offering a fresh take on a crucial phase of European history, this book explores the years between the 1980s and 1990s when the European Union took shape. Whilst contributing to existing literature on the Maastricht Treaty and European integration at the end of the twentieth century, the book also brings those debates into the twenty-first century and makes connections with longer-term issues. The transformation of the European political climate in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008, and the watershed Brexit vote in 2016, has made it all the more urgent to reconsider the way scholars and opinion-makers have looked at European integration in the past. Drawing from recently released archival documents, the authors analyse European cooperation as part of the broader international history in which it unfolded, taking into account the changes in the Cold War order and the advance of a new phase of globalisation. Comparing and contrasting the debates, objectives and achievements of the 1980s and 1990s with the current political landscape of the European Union, this book proposes a novel interpretation of the choices that were made during the Maastricht years, and of their longer-term consequences.

This book analyzes how financial liberalization affected the development of the financial crisis in Europe, with particular attention given to the ways in which power asymmetries within Western Europe facilitated financial liberalization and distributed the costs and gains from it. The author combines institutional narrative analysis with empirical surveys and econometrics, as well as country-level studies of financial liberalization and its consequences before and after the 2008 Global Financial Crisis.

This timely volume traces the political, financial, and economicsteps toward financial union in Europe, focusing on the politicaleconomy of the process--notably the dynamics of a Europe ofsovereign states. Few aspects of the great European integration project have been as difficult and fraught with political conflict as the creation of a single financial market and monetary union. It is clear, however, that monetary union and financial integration are now on the front-burner in Europe, and will remain so until at least the year 2000. This timely volume traces the political, financial, and economic steps toward financial union in Europe, focusing on the political economy of the process--notably the dynamics of a Europe of sovereign states. It is the first integrated view of the issue, combining political, economic, and financial perspectives. Authoritative, comprehensive, and accessible, the volume is essential reading for students, researchers, policy makers, journalists, and anyone who needs to know about financial integration in Europe.

This book showcases written dialogue from Brendan Brown and Philippe Simonnot on the subject of European monetary turmoil past and present and what hope there could be for future reform. Starting with the collapse of the gold standard in 1914, proceeding to the brief gold-dollar standard of the mid inter-war years, on to the collapse of Bretton Woods and the heyday of the Deutsche mark and ultimately discussing the euro, this book looks at a broad range of financial history alongside many new and provoking hypotheses about the devastating monetary turbulence of the successive eras, always with a focus on the US monetary hegemon. A highlight of the dialogue is an exploration of how past and future crises could combine to give birth to sound money in Europe – the launch, in effect, of a new euro. In the questions and answers within these pages, the authors draw on global examples and the challenges for Europe in deciding how to adapt to successive monetary shocks from the US, crafting a book that would be of interest to general finance and economics readers alongside students, researchers, and policymakers.

Will the Euro survive? Where is the European financial crisis headed? What will it mean for global and US markets? In this short book, internationally respected Financial Times journalist John Authers illuminates today's European financial crisis and the massive forces increasingly buffeting world and US economies. Authers explains why a strong recovery remains far away, why the risk of a disastrous "final" crisis remains terrifyingly real, and how investors can best navigate today's brutally challenging markets. The European Financial Crisis reveals why the 2010/2011 market rallies were so fearful, and why their underlying assumptions -- continued Chinese growth, bailouts, progress towards bank solvency, more easy "Fed" money -- have proven so tenuous. Above all, Authers shows how the Eurozone crisis uncovers today's worst unaddressed risk: the markets' loss of confidence in governments. This brief discussion offers insights into underlying flaws in the banking system and the Eurozone's structure that remain unaddressed; how cheap money and bailouts have bought time that is rapidly running out; and the increasingly frightening signs of "perverse synchronization": forex, equity, credit, and commodity markets massively moving in tandem. He also offers specific recommendations for what policymakers can and must do now to restore the long-term health of the global markets.

This 1994 volume examines the ramifications of deregulation in various financial markets throughout the 1980s.

In the years leading up the global financial crisis, the European Union (EU) had emerged as a central actor in global financial governance, almost rivalling the United States in influence. While the USA and the EU continue to dominate financial rule setting in the post-crisis world, the context in which they do so has changed dramatically. Pre-crisis ideas about laissez-faire regulation have been discarded in favour of more interventionist ones. The G20 and the Financial Stability Board have been charged with stronger coordination of global efforts. At the same time, jurisdictions have re-emphasized the need "to get their own regulatory house in order" before committing to further global harmonization. And through banks failures and massive bail-outs, the financial sector – hitherto a driving force behind the cross-border integration of finance – has been reconfigured. This book asks a straightforward question: what have these and other key post-crisis trends in global finance done to the position that the European Union occupies in it? The contributions to this book analyse the link between financial governance in the European Union and on the global level from diverse theoretical angles, and they cover the main issues that will shape the future European role on the global regulatory stage. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy.