As a long-run competitor and collaborator with the dollar, the euro creates the potential for a bipolar international monetary system, offering unprecedented challenges and opportunities to economic policymakers. This book explores the euro's international role, its record till its fifth year, and its future.
This book is the first comprehensive political and economic account of the birth and development of the Euro. Today the Euro is the supranational currency for sixteen European countries and the world's second-largest reserve currency. David Marsh tells the story of the rivalries, intrigues, and deal making that brought about a currency for Europe, and he analyzes the achievements and shortcomings of its first decade of existence. While the Euro represents a remarkable triumph of political will, great pressures are building on the single currency. Drawing on more than 100 interviews with leading figures associated with the Euro, and scores of secret documents from international archives, Marsh underscores the Euro's importance for the global economy, in particular for U.S. and British economic and political agendas. Hidden facts and fresh insights from The Euro --How the legacy of France and Germany's tortuous relations affects the Euro--Why the United Kingdom is unlikely to accept the Euro before 2025--The impact on the Euro of the U.S. credit crisis--How the Euro has rebounded against the aspirations of its founders--How Italy and Spain have massively lost competitiveness--Why radical changes must be adopted to prevent a European upheaval
The Future of the Euro is an attempt by political economists to scrutinize the fundamental causes of the euro crisis, determine how it could be fixed, and consider its possible futures. The book makes three interrelated arguments about the euro's problem, experience, and future that stress the primacy of political over economic factors.
This Open Access book offers a novel view on the benefits of a lasting variation between the member states in the EU. In order to bring together thirty very different European states and their citizens, the EU will have to offer more scope for variation. Unlike the existing differentiation by means of opt-outs and deviations, variation is not a concession intended to resolve impasses in negotiations; it is, rather, a different structuring principle. It takes differences in needs and in democratically supported convictions seriously. A common core remains necessary, specifically concerning the basic principles of democracy, rule of law, fundamental rights and freedoms, and the common market. By taking this approach, the authors remove the pressure to embrace uniformity from the debate about the EU’s future. The book discusses forms of variation that fall both within and outside the current framework of European Union Treaties. The scope for these variations is mapped out in three domains: the internal market; the euro; and asylum, migration and border control.
From the acclaimed author of Bernanke’s Test, “an essential title for any reader with investments or interest in financial instruments” (Library Journal). The End of the Euro begins with an overview of the birth of the euro itself. Understanding this history is essential to understand the anomalies built into the project from the beginning. These anomalies form the subject of chapter two, along with how they led to the situation that turned Greece, Portugal, and Spain into euro-destroying economic disaster areas. Chapter three shows how this was not an unforeseeable situation, as Europe’s history is filled with earlier failed attempts to build monetary unions. Chapter four is focused on Germany, by far the most important country within EMU, and why the chances of Germany leaving the union are much higher than is generally assumed. The book concludes with an analysis of what lies in wait for the remains of the monetary union—and for a deeply divided and troubled continent in general. Either the EMU transforms itself fundamentally or it disintegrates. “Johan Van Overtveldt is a consistently insightful and incisive writer and I await each of his books with real anticipation.” —Tyler Cowen, The Marginal Revolution blog “A whole generation of Europeans has found comfort in the idea that economic cooperation has overruled the pull of power politics and even some basic laws of economics. This book forcefully squashes that illusion. A must-read!” —Jonathan Holslag, research fellow at the Brussels Free University
John Pinder and Simon Usherwood explain the EU in plain readable English. They show how and why it has developed, how the institutions work, and what it does - from the single market to the euro, and from agriculture to the environment.
'The Brussels Commission has just suspended its senior economist, Bernard Connolly, for writing a book savaging the prospects for a common currency. There are many who now believe he should be lauded as a prophet.' Observer, Editorial, 1 October 1995'Mr. Connolly's longstanding proposition that the foisting of a common currency upon so many disparate nations would end in ruin is getting a much wider hearing...' New York Times, 17 November 2011When first published in 1995, The Rotten Heart of Europe caused outrage and delight - here was a Brussels insider, a senior EU economist, daring to talk openly about the likely pitfalls of European monetary union. Bernard Connolly lost his job at the Commission, but his book was greeted as a profound and persuasive expose of the would-be 'monetary masters of the world.' His brave act of defiance became headline news - and his book a major international bestseller. In a substantial new introduction, Connolly returns to his prophetic account of the double-talk surrounding the efforts of politicians, bankers and bureaucrats to force Europe into a crippling monetary straitjacket. Hidden agendas are laid bare, skulduggery exposed and economic fallacies are skewered, producing a horrifying conclusion. No one who wants to understand the workings of the EU, past, present and future can afford to miss this enthralling and deeply disturbing book.
How philosophical differences between Eurozone nations led to the Euro crisis—and where to go from here Why is Europe’s great monetary endeavor, the Euro, in trouble? A string of economic difficulties in Eurozone nations has left observers wondering whether the currency union can survive. In this book, Markus Brunnermeier, Harold James, and Jean-Pierre Landau argue that the core problem with the Euro lies in the philosophical differences between the founding countries of the Eurozone, particularly Germany and France. But the authors also show how these seemingly incompatible differences can be reconciled to ensure Europe’s survival. Weaving together economic analysis and historical reflection, The Euro and the Battle of Ideas provides a forensic investigation and a road map for Europe’s future.