Monetary and Exchange Rate Systems

A Global View of Financial Crises

Edited by Louis-Philippe Rochon, Full Professor, Laurentian University, Canada, Editor-in-Chief, Review of Political Economy and Founding Editor Emeritus, Review of Keynesian Economics and Sergio Rossi, Full Professor of Economics, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

Combining critical perspectives with a positive contribution to economic policy, both national and international, this book considers the causes and consequences of recent financial crises presenting cutting-edge material.

‘This is an important, original, and highly topical volume, in which distinguished contributors from Europe, Asia, North America, and Mexico investigate the causes of recent international financial crises, and discuss a wide range of alternative policies to prevent future financial instability. The contributors share a broadly post-Keynesian perspective, and are therefore highly critical both of the Washington Consensus and of the case for unrestrained financial liberalization. While they agree on the need for tighter regulation and for international capital controls, they differ on other important questions, including the respective merits of fixed and floating exchange rate regimes. That gives to this collection of contributions a welcome element of creative tension. No-one with an interest in reforming the international monetary regime can afford to neglect this book.’
– John King, La Trobe University, Victoria, Australia

‘This is a stimulating collection of the range of views bubbling up as a consequence of the perceived failure of the Washington Consensus, loosely unified by the laudable ambition to extend the Minsky-Kindleberger analysis of financial crisis to the conditions facing emerging market economies.’
– Perry Mehrling, College, Columbia University, US

‘The era of globalization and financial liberalization has been remarkable for financial instability and crises. This book provides some great contributions from a range of views and countries to the debates on the causes and consequences of these crises, and on policy perspectives that can avoid further instability and its costs.’
– Malcolm Sawyer, University of Leeds, UK

‘This is an important and timely book. Views on exchange rate regimes and the international monetary system cut right across the traditional “party lines” among economists, and Louis-Philippe Rochon and Sergio Rossi have provided an invaluable service by collecting the opinions of distinguished Post Keynesian economists from ten different countries and three continents. Is there an international solution to global economic problems? Or should the individual nations, particularly in the developing world, take a more nationalistic “neo-mercantilist” line?’
– John Smithin, York University, Toronto, Canada