This book shows how the transformation of Britain's economic performance has been based on control of public expenditure, improving competitiveness, co-operative industrial relations and a large favourable contribution from inward investment. In contrast, Europe has suffered from rising unemployment, while misguided trade policies have obstructed the exploitation of the IT revolution. Europe's failures will undermine the EMU project. Britain will do well to keep clear. The book concludes with chapters on the modern relevance of Locke on inflation, Ricardo on public debt and Condillac on the creation of competitive market economies.
Banking on Sterling: Britain's Independence from the Euro Zone, by Ophelia Eglene, provides an in-depth analysis of the British policy on the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) over the past twenty years. Eglene demonstrates how the Conservative government of John Major and the Labour government of Tony Blair implemented policies that had the same overriding goals. The first of their shared goals was to continue being involved in decisions on the remaining details of the EMU and to avoid discrimination in the European Union by appearing as a member state willing to embrace the full European project at an indeterminate point. The second goal was to address the conflicting preferences of domestic economic actors with an ambiguous policy aimed at buying time. Pressure on the British government came from both the business and financial sectors on the question of EMU membership. While the business community was divided on the euro, there was one sector, export-oriented producers, strongly in favor. The financial sector, for its part, needed more time to clearly assess where its interests lay, and it insisted that the government not rush a decision one way or the other. Banking on Sterling demonstrates that the government--no matter which party was in power--always had in mind the welfare of the financial sector. When the conclusion was reached in London that its financial sector would benefit more from an offshore position than as a member of the EMU, the British government provided both direct and indirect compensation to the export-oriented business sector that had definitely lost the battle for the euro. Ophelia Eglene's Banking on Sterling: Britain's Independence from the Euro Zone effectively shows the unequal influence of business and finance on the British economy.
Why have the states of Europe agreed to create an Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and a single European currency? What will decide the fate of this bold project? This book explains why monetary integration has deepened in Europe from the Bretton Woods era to the present day. McNamara argues that the development of a neoliberal economic policy consensus among European leaders in the years after the first oil crisis was crucial to stability in the European Monetary System and progress towards EMU. She identifies two factors, rising capital mobility and changing ideas about the government's proper role in monetary policymaking, as critical to the neoliberal consensus but warns that unresolved social tensions in this consensus may provoke a political backlash against EMU and its neoliberal reforms.McNamara's findings are relevant not only to European monetary integration, but to more general questions about the effects of international capital flows on states. Although this book delineates a range of constraints created by economic interdependence, McNamara rejects the notion that international market forces simply dictate government policy choice. She demonstrates that the process of neoliberal policy change is a historically dependent one, shaped by policymakers' shared beliefs and interpretations of their experiences in the global economy.
Economic and monetary union in the European Union represents a massive change for Europe and for the world. The Road to Maastricht identifies why the agreement was possible and how the agreement was made. The book examines the motives that inspired European political leaders, the strategies that they pursued, and the institutions that were used to achieve monetary union. Drawing on a wide range of sources and unprecedented research and interviews, the book combines careful political analysis with new information about the way in which European Monetary Union was negotiated. It delves into the complex forces at work in Europe, including the cross-national political interactions, to produce an authoritative account of the boldest and riskiest venture in the history of European integration.
Europe’s financial crisis cannot be blamed on the Euro, Harold James contends in this probing exploration of the whys, whens, whos, and what-ifs of European monetary union. The current crisis goes deeper, to a series of problems that were debated but not resolved at the time of the Euro’s invention. Since the 1960s, Europeans had been looking for a way to address two conundrums simultaneously: the dollar’s privileged position in the international monetary system, and Germany’s persistent current account surpluses in Europe. The Euro was created under a politically independent central bank to meet the primary goal of price stability. But while the monetary side of union was clearly conceived, other prerequisites of stability were beyond the reach of technocratic central bankers. Issues such as fiscal rules and Europe-wide banking supervision and regulation were thoroughly discussed during planning in the late 1980s and 1990s, but remained in the hands of member states. That omission proved to be a cause of crisis decades later. Here is an account that helps readers understand the European monetary crisis in depth, by tracing behind-the-scenes negotiations using an array of sources unavailable until now, notably from the European Community’s Committee of Central Bank Governors and the Delors Committee of 1988–89, which set out the plan for how Europe could reach its goal of monetary union. As this foundational study makes clear, it was the constant friction between politicians and technocrats that shaped the Euro. And, Euro or no Euro, this clash will continue into the future.
This study patterns national identity over a number of important historical milestones and brings the debates over Europe up-to-date with an analysis of recent happenings including the referendum on Scottish independence, the global economic crisis and the current crisis in Syria.
The focus of this book is on the fifteen-member European Union but its coverage extends to many other bodies which form part of today's Europe, such as the Council of Europe, the European Economic Area and Western European Union.
Should Britain join the Euro? Is the "special relationship" between Britain and the United States a thing of the past? Will the British ever be culturally European? These are just some of the burning questions addressed in this completely up-to-date, powerful collection--a compilation of superb writing from Britain's most prominent politicians and commentators.
