Peter Taylor-Gooby, Benjamin Leruth, and Heejung Chung (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- August 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198790266
- eISBN:
- 9780191831584
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198790266.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
European welfare states are undergoing profound change, driven by globalisation, technical changes, and population ageing. More immediately the aftermath of the Great Recession and unprecedented ...
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European welfare states are undergoing profound change, driven by globalisation, technical changes, and population ageing. More immediately the aftermath of the Great Recession and unprecedented levels of immigration have imposed additional pressures. This book examines welfare state transformations across a representative range of European countries and at the EU level, and considers likely new directions in social policy. It reviews the dominant neo-liberal austerity response and discusses social investment, fightback, welfare chauvinism and protectionism. It argues that the class solidarities and cleavages that shaped the development of welfare states are no longer powerful. Tensions surrounding divisions between old and young, women and men, immigrants and denizens, and the winners in a new more competitive world and those who feel left behind are becoming steadily more important. European countries have entered a period of greater political instability and this is reflected in policy directions. Austerity predominates nearly everywhere, but patterns of social investment, protectionism, neo-Keynesian intervention and fightback vary between countries. We identify areas of convergence and difference in European welfare state futures.Less
European welfare states are undergoing profound change, driven by globalisation, technical changes, and population ageing. More immediately the aftermath of the Great Recession and unprecedented levels of immigration have imposed additional pressures. This book examines welfare state transformations across a representative range of European countries and at the EU level, and considers likely new directions in social policy. It reviews the dominant neo-liberal austerity response and discusses social investment, fightback, welfare chauvinism and protectionism. It argues that the class solidarities and cleavages that shaped the development of welfare states are no longer powerful. Tensions surrounding divisions between old and young, women and men, immigrants and denizens, and the winners in a new more competitive world and those who feel left behind are becoming steadily more important. European countries have entered a period of greater political instability and this is reflected in policy directions. Austerity predominates nearly everywhere, but patterns of social investment, protectionism, neo-Keynesian intervention and fightback vary between countries. We identify areas of convergence and difference in European welfare state futures.
Gustavo A. Flores-Macias
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199891658
- eISBN:
- 9780199933402
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199891658.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
Between 1998 and 2010, an unprecedented wave of left-of-center candidates reached power in Latin America. In spite of a shared concern for social inequality and opposition to the Washington ...
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Between 1998 and 2010, an unprecedented wave of left-of-center candidates reached power in Latin America. In spite of a shared concern for social inequality and opposition to the Washington Consensus, their governments pursued dramatically different economic policies. Why did some governments reverse neoliberal economic policies amid the supremacy of market orthodoxy? Why did others embrace market orthodoxy after denouncing it for decades from the opposition? Why were nationalizations, price controls, and trade barriers implemented in Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Venezuela, but not in Brazil, Chile, Nicaragua, and Uruguay? More generally, what are the conditions that make the initiation and maintenance of economic reforms likely? In answering these questions, this book conducts a theoretical and empirical study of economic reforms in Latin America. It takes stock of the left’s economic transformations in the region and challenges widely held views that resource dependence, economic crises, or strong executives are responsible for them. Instead, it argues that party systems are crucial in explaining reform: when institutionalized, party systems are likely to preserve the prevailing market orthodoxy; when in disarray, they are conducive to drastic economic changes. Marshalling evidence drawn from ten countries and case studies of the governments of Ricardo Lagos in Chile, Lula in Brazil, and Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, this study not only sheds light on one of the most puzzling aspects of contemporary Latin America, but also advances our general understanding of the left as a political ideology, economic reforms, and party systems beyond the region.Less
Between 1998 and 2010, an unprecedented wave of left-of-center candidates reached power in Latin America. In spite of a shared concern for social inequality and opposition to the Washington Consensus, their governments pursued dramatically different economic policies. Why did some governments reverse neoliberal economic policies amid the supremacy of market orthodoxy? Why did others embrace market orthodoxy after denouncing it for decades from the opposition? Why were nationalizations, price controls, and trade barriers implemented in Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Venezuela, but not in Brazil, Chile, Nicaragua, and Uruguay? More generally, what are the conditions that make the initiation and maintenance of economic reforms likely? In answering these questions, this book conducts a theoretical and empirical study of economic reforms in Latin America. It takes stock of the left’s economic transformations in the region and challenges widely held views that resource dependence, economic crises, or strong executives are responsible for them. Instead, it argues that party systems are crucial in explaining reform: when institutionalized, party systems are likely to preserve the prevailing market orthodoxy; when in disarray, they are conducive to drastic economic changes. Marshalling evidence drawn from ten countries and case studies of the governments of Ricardo Lagos in Chile, Lula in Brazil, and Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, this study not only sheds light on one of the most puzzling aspects of contemporary Latin America, but also advances our general understanding of the left as a political ideology, economic reforms, and party systems beyond the region.
Breena Holland
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780199692071
- eISBN:
- 9780191799488
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199692071.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Environmental Politics, Political Economy
This book advances a new distributional framework to guide the evaluation and design of environmental policies. Drawing on capabilities theory, and especially on Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities ...
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This book advances a new distributional framework to guide the evaluation and design of environmental policies. Drawing on capabilities theory, and especially on Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities approach to justice, the book proposes that environmental policies should aim to secure the basic capabilities that make it possible for people to live a flourishing and dignified human life. Holland establishes the protection of the natural environment as central to securing these capabilities and then goes on to consider the implications for debates in environmental valuation, policy justification, and administrative rulemaking. In each of these areas, she demonstrates how her “capabilities approach to social and environmental justice” can minimize substantive and procedural inequities that result from how we evaluate and design environmental policies in contemporary society. Holland’s proposals include valuing environmental goods and services as comparable—but not commensurable—across the same dimension of wellbeing of different people, justifying environmental policies with respect to both the capability thresholds they secure and the capability ceilings they establish, and subjecting the outcomes of participatory decisions in the administrative rulemaking process to stronger substantive standards. In developing and applying this unique approach to justice, Holland primarily focuses on questions of domestic environmental policy. However, in the closing chapter she turns to theoretical debates about international climate policy and sketches how her approach to justice could inform both the philosophical grounding and practical application of efforts to achieve global climate justice. Engaging current debates in environmental policy and political theory, the book is a sustained exercise of both applied and environmental political theory.Less
This book advances a new distributional framework to guide the evaluation and design of environmental policies. Drawing on capabilities theory, and especially on Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities approach to justice, the book proposes that environmental policies should aim to secure the basic capabilities that make it possible for people to live a flourishing and dignified human life. Holland establishes the protection of the natural environment as central to securing these capabilities and then goes on to consider the implications for debates in environmental valuation, policy justification, and administrative rulemaking. In each of these areas, she demonstrates how her “capabilities approach to social and environmental justice” can minimize substantive and procedural inequities that result from how we evaluate and design environmental policies in contemporary society. Holland’s proposals include valuing environmental goods and services as comparable—but not commensurable—across the same dimension of wellbeing of different people, justifying environmental policies with respect to both the capability thresholds they secure and the capability ceilings they establish, and subjecting the outcomes of participatory decisions in the administrative rulemaking process to stronger substantive standards. In developing and applying this unique approach to justice, Holland primarily focuses on questions of domestic environmental policy. However, in the closing chapter she turns to theoretical debates about international climate policy and sketches how her approach to justice could inform both the philosophical grounding and practical application of efforts to achieve global climate justice. Engaging current debates in environmental policy and political theory, the book is a sustained exercise of both applied and environmental political theory.
Kenneth Dyson and Ivo Maes (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780198735915
- eISBN:
- 9780191799860
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735915.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union, Political Economy
The book examines key intellectuals who were directly and actively involved in the process of designing a European monetary union that would be sustainable. Their role was distinguishable from that ...
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The book examines key intellectuals who were directly and actively involved in the process of designing a European monetary union that would be sustainable. Their role was distinguishable from that of the political founders and drivers of this process and from that of expert advisers. They were embedded in the process of giving substance to monetary union and gained influence through their formidable resources of character and intellect. The selected architects include Raymond Barre, Jacques Delors, Roy Jenkins, Alexandre Lamfalussy, Robert Marjolin, Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, Karl-Otto Pöhl, Hans Tietmeyer, Robert Triffin, and Pierre Werner. The book looks at their intellectual biographies, the ideas to which they became committed, their network-building skills, and their practical involvement in the issues of monetary integration and union. The principal emphasis is on their individual contributions, their legacies as seen from the vantage point of the Euro Area crisis, and the prescience and adequacy of their views about the appropriate foundations of EMU. The book considers the strengths and limits of intellectual biography and the thorny question of the roles of structure and agency in historical explanation. It also reflects on the question of the architects’ share of blame in the design flaws of European monetary union.Less
The book examines key intellectuals who were directly and actively involved in the process of designing a European monetary union that would be sustainable. Their role was distinguishable from that of the political founders and drivers of this process and from that of expert advisers. They were embedded in the process of giving substance to monetary union and gained influence through their formidable resources of character and intellect. The selected architects include Raymond Barre, Jacques Delors, Roy Jenkins, Alexandre Lamfalussy, Robert Marjolin, Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, Karl-Otto Pöhl, Hans Tietmeyer, Robert Triffin, and Pierre Werner. The book looks at their intellectual biographies, the ideas to which they became committed, their network-building skills, and their practical involvement in the issues of monetary integration and union. The principal emphasis is on their individual contributions, their legacies as seen from the vantage point of the Euro Area crisis, and the prescience and adequacy of their views about the appropriate foundations of EMU. The book considers the strengths and limits of intellectual biography and the thorny question of the roles of structure and agency in historical explanation. It also reflects on the question of the architects’ share of blame in the design flaws of European monetary union.
Rachel A. Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198809968
- eISBN:
- 9780191847219
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198809968.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
States and banks have traditionally maintained close ties. At various points in time, states have used banks to manage their economies and soak up government debt, while banks enjoyed regulatory ...
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States and banks have traditionally maintained close ties. At various points in time, states have used banks to manage their economies and soak up government debt, while banks enjoyed regulatory forbearance, restricted competition and implicit or explicit guarantees from their home governments. The political foundations of banks have thus been powerful and enduring, with actors on both sides of the aisle reluctant to sever relations. The central argument of this book, however, is that in the world’s largest integrated market, Europe, political ties between states and banks have been transformed. Specifically, through a combination of post-communist transition, monetary union, and economic crisis, states in Europe no longer wield preponderant influence over their banks. In the East, high levels of foreign bank ownership have disrupted politically infused bank–state ties, while in the Eurozone, European Banking Union has supra-nationalized bank governance. Banking on Markets explains why we have witnessed the radical denationalization of this politically vital sector, as well as the consequences for economic volatility and policy autonomy. Contrary to expectations, marketized bank–state ties and elevated foreign bank ownership levels mitigated volatility in Europe’s recent economic crises. But marketized bank–state ties also limit national economic policy discretion. The findings from Europe have implications for other world regions, which, to varying degrees, have also experienced intensified pressure on their traditional models of domestic political control over finance.Less
States and banks have traditionally maintained close ties. At various points in time, states have used banks to manage their economies and soak up government debt, while banks enjoyed regulatory forbearance, restricted competition and implicit or explicit guarantees from their home governments. The political foundations of banks have thus been powerful and enduring, with actors on both sides of the aisle reluctant to sever relations. The central argument of this book, however, is that in the world’s largest integrated market, Europe, political ties between states and banks have been transformed. Specifically, through a combination of post-communist transition, monetary union, and economic crisis, states in Europe no longer wield preponderant influence over their banks. In the East, high levels of foreign bank ownership have disrupted politically infused bank–state ties, while in the Eurozone, European Banking Union has supra-nationalized bank governance. Banking on Markets explains why we have witnessed the radical denationalization of this politically vital sector, as well as the consequences for economic volatility and policy autonomy. Contrary to expectations, marketized bank–state ties and elevated foreign bank ownership levels mitigated volatility in Europe’s recent economic crises. But marketized bank–state ties also limit national economic policy discretion. The findings from Europe have implications for other world regions, which, to varying degrees, have also experienced intensified pressure on their traditional models of domestic political control over finance.
Andreas Busch
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199218813
- eISBN:
- 9780191711763
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199218813.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics, Political Economy
Does globalization erode the nation state's capacity to act? Are nation states forced to change their policies even if this goes against the democratic will of their electorates? How does government ...
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Does globalization erode the nation state's capacity to act? Are nation states forced to change their policies even if this goes against the democratic will of their electorates? How does government action change under conditions of globalization? Questions like these have not only featured highly in political debates in recent years, but also in academic discourse. This book contributes to that debate. The general question it addresses is whether globalization leads to policy convergence — a central, but contested topic in the debate, as theoretical arguments can be advanced both in favour of and against the likelihood of such a development. More specifically, the book contains detailed empirical case studies of four countries (the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Switzerland) in a policy area where state action has been particularly challenged by the emergence of world-wide, around-the-clock financial markets in the last few decades, namely that of the regulation and supervision of the banking industry. Based on careful analysis of historical developments, specific challenges, the character of policy networks and institutions, and their interaction in the political process, this book argues that nation states still possess considerable room for manoeuvre in pursuing their policies. Even if they choose supranational coordination and cooperation, their national institutional configurations still function as filters in the globalization process.Less
Does globalization erode the nation state's capacity to act? Are nation states forced to change their policies even if this goes against the democratic will of their electorates? How does government action change under conditions of globalization? Questions like these have not only featured highly in political debates in recent years, but also in academic discourse. This book contributes to that debate. The general question it addresses is whether globalization leads to policy convergence — a central, but contested topic in the debate, as theoretical arguments can be advanced both in favour of and against the likelihood of such a development. More specifically, the book contains detailed empirical case studies of four countries (the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Switzerland) in a policy area where state action has been particularly challenged by the emergence of world-wide, around-the-clock financial markets in the last few decades, namely that of the regulation and supervision of the banking industry. Based on careful analysis of historical developments, specific challenges, the character of policy networks and institutions, and their interaction in the political process, this book argues that nation states still possess considerable room for manoeuvre in pursuing their policies. Even if they choose supranational coordination and cooperation, their national institutional configurations still function as filters in the globalization process.
Devi Sridhar
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199549962
- eISBN:
- 9780191720499
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199549962.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics, Political Economy
We live in an increasingly prosperous world, yet the estimated number of undernourished people has risen, and will continue to rise with the doubling of food prices. A large majority of those ...
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We live in an increasingly prosperous world, yet the estimated number of undernourished people has risen, and will continue to rise with the doubling of food prices. A large majority of those affected are living in India. Why have strategies to combat hunger, especially in India, failed so badly? How did a nation that prides itself on booming economic growth come to have half of its preschool population undernourished? Using the case study of a World Bank nutrition project in India, this book takes on these questions and probes the issues surrounding development assistance, strategies to eliminate undernutrition, and how hunger should be fundamentally understood and addressed. Throughout the book, the underlying tension between choice and circumstance is explored. How much are individuals able to determine their life choices? How much should policy-makers take underlying social forces into account when designing policy? This book examines the possibilities and obstacles to eliminating child hunger. This book is not just about nutrition, it is an attempt to uncover the workings of power through a close look at the structures, discourses, and agencies through which nutrition policy operates. In this process, the source of nutrition policy in the World Bank is traced to those affected by the policies in India.Less
We live in an increasingly prosperous world, yet the estimated number of undernourished people has risen, and will continue to rise with the doubling of food prices. A large majority of those affected are living in India. Why have strategies to combat hunger, especially in India, failed so badly? How did a nation that prides itself on booming economic growth come to have half of its preschool population undernourished? Using the case study of a World Bank nutrition project in India, this book takes on these questions and probes the issues surrounding development assistance, strategies to eliminate undernutrition, and how hunger should be fundamentally understood and addressed. Throughout the book, the underlying tension between choice and circumstance is explored. How much are individuals able to determine their life choices? How much should policy-makers take underlying social forces into account when designing policy? This book examines the possibilities and obstacles to eliminating child hunger. This book is not just about nutrition, it is an attempt to uncover the workings of power through a close look at the structures, discourses, and agencies through which nutrition policy operates. In this process, the source of nutrition policy in the World Bank is traced to those affected by the policies in India.
Angela B. McCracken
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- April 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199908066
- eISBN:
- 9780199381517
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199908066.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics, Political Economy
This book takes seriously the frequently maligned and trivialized global beauty economy, just as it has become one of the most important worldwide industries. Through the lens of beauty products, ...
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This book takes seriously the frequently maligned and trivialized global beauty economy, just as it has become one of the most important worldwide industries. Through the lens of beauty products, practices, and ideas of youth in Guadalajara, Mexico, the book analyzes whether and how beauty norms are changing in relation to the globalizing beauty economy; who benefits and who loses from beauty globalization; and what this means for gender norms among youth. Weaving together an ethnographic approach to understanding beauty practices, global political economy, and feminist analysis, the book presents a feminist analysis of the global economy of beauty. Rather than a sign of frivolity, the beauty economy is intimately connected to youths’ social and economic development. As in the popular fiesta de quince años, a fifteen-year-old girl’s birthday party, cosmetic makeovers have become a modern rite of passage for girls, enabling social connections and differentiations, as well as entrepreneurial activities. The global beauty economy is a phenomenon generated by young people, mostly women, laboring in, teaching, and consuming beauty. Globalization in the beauty economy is a phenomenon propelled by youth, eager for belonging and originality, using every mechanism at their disposal to look good. Contrary to popular wisdom, globalization in the beauty economy is not homogenizing beauty standards to a Western ideal; it is diversifying beauty standards. Globalization, combined with youths’ desires for uniqueness, is enabling the spread of a diversity of beauty cultures, including alternative visions of gender-appropriate looks and behavior.Less
This book takes seriously the frequently maligned and trivialized global beauty economy, just as it has become one of the most important worldwide industries. Through the lens of beauty products, practices, and ideas of youth in Guadalajara, Mexico, the book analyzes whether and how beauty norms are changing in relation to the globalizing beauty economy; who benefits and who loses from beauty globalization; and what this means for gender norms among youth. Weaving together an ethnographic approach to understanding beauty practices, global political economy, and feminist analysis, the book presents a feminist analysis of the global economy of beauty. Rather than a sign of frivolity, the beauty economy is intimately connected to youths’ social and economic development. As in the popular fiesta de quince años, a fifteen-year-old girl’s birthday party, cosmetic makeovers have become a modern rite of passage for girls, enabling social connections and differentiations, as well as entrepreneurial activities. The global beauty economy is a phenomenon generated by young people, mostly women, laboring in, teaching, and consuming beauty. Globalization in the beauty economy is a phenomenon propelled by youth, eager for belonging and originality, using every mechanism at their disposal to look good. Contrary to popular wisdom, globalization in the beauty economy is not homogenizing beauty standards to a Western ideal; it is diversifying beauty standards. Globalization, combined with youths’ desires for uniqueness, is enabling the spread of a diversity of beauty cultures, including alternative visions of gender-appropriate looks and behavior.
Maurizio Ferrera
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199284665
- eISBN:
- 9780191603273
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199284660.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
To what extent and in what ways have European integration redrawn the boundaries of national welfare states? What are the effects of such redrawing? These questions are interesting and relevant ...
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To what extent and in what ways have European integration redrawn the boundaries of national welfare states? What are the effects of such redrawing? These questions are interesting and relevant because boundaries “count”: they are a pre-requisite for bonding individuals, groups, and territorial units, and for activating or strengthening their dispositions to share. Historically, welfare state formation can be read as a process of boundary-building — essentially through the establishment of compulsory public insurance schemes. European integration has prompted a reversal of this process: free movement and competition rules have in fact started to challenge the traditional bounding prerogatives of the nation-state in the social sphere. Today, the EU constrains not only the scope and content of bounding decisions (who is entitled to share what), but also the very “right to bound” in the first place. Such constraints have far reaching economic and financial implications. But their social and political implications may be even greater, given the importance of nation-based social sharing for material life chances, cultural identities and legitimation dynamics. As shown by the chapters in this book, reshuffling the “boundaries of welfare” can destabilise the basic architecture of Europe’s national societies and political systems. In order to counter this destabilisation, a carefully designed strategy of institutional reform is needed, capable of reconciling “solidarity” and “Europe” through stronger citizenship rights and more socially friendly regulatory instruments.Less
To what extent and in what ways have European integration redrawn the boundaries of national welfare states? What are the effects of such redrawing? These questions are interesting and relevant because boundaries “count”: they are a pre-requisite for bonding individuals, groups, and territorial units, and for activating or strengthening their dispositions to share. Historically, welfare state formation can be read as a process of boundary-building — essentially through the establishment of compulsory public insurance schemes. European integration has prompted a reversal of this process: free movement and competition rules have in fact started to challenge the traditional bounding prerogatives of the nation-state in the social sphere. Today, the EU constrains not only the scope and content of bounding decisions (who is entitled to share what), but also the very “right to bound” in the first place. Such constraints have far reaching economic and financial implications. But their social and political implications may be even greater, given the importance of nation-based social sharing for material life chances, cultural identities and legitimation dynamics. As shown by the chapters in this book, reshuffling the “boundaries of welfare” can destabilise the basic architecture of Europe’s national societies and political systems. In order to counter this destabilisation, a carefully designed strategy of institutional reform is needed, capable of reconciling “solidarity” and “Europe” through stronger citizenship rights and more socially friendly regulatory instruments.
Daniel McDowell
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- December 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780190605766
- eISBN:
- 9780190609504
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190605766.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy, International Relations and Politics
When financial crises occur, it has long been accepted that national economies need a lender of last resort to stabilize markets. In today’s global financial system, crises are rarely confined to one ...
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When financial crises occur, it has long been accepted that national economies need a lender of last resort to stabilize markets. In today’s global financial system, crises are rarely confined to one country. Indeed, they often go global. Yet, there is no formal international lender of last resort (ILLR) to perform this function for the world economy. Conventional wisdom says that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has emerged in recent decades as the de facto ILLR. Yet that premise is incomplete. This book explores how the United States has for decades regularly complemented the Fund’s ILLR role by selectively providing billions of dollars in emergency loans to foreign economies in crisis. Why would US policymakers ever put national financial resources at risk to bail out foreign governments and citizens to whom they are not beholden when the IMF was created for this purpose? I argue the United States has been compelled to provide such rescues unilaterally when it believes a multilateral response via the IMF is either too slow or too small to protect vital US economic and financial interests. Through a combination of historical case studies and statistical analysis, I uncover the defensive motives behind US decisions to provide global liquidity from the 1960s through the 2008 global financial crisis. The book paints a more complete picture of how international financial crises have been managed and highlights the unique role that the United States has played in stabilizing the world economy in troubled times.Less
When financial crises occur, it has long been accepted that national economies need a lender of last resort to stabilize markets. In today’s global financial system, crises are rarely confined to one country. Indeed, they often go global. Yet, there is no formal international lender of last resort (ILLR) to perform this function for the world economy. Conventional wisdom says that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has emerged in recent decades as the de facto ILLR. Yet that premise is incomplete. This book explores how the United States has for decades regularly complemented the Fund’s ILLR role by selectively providing billions of dollars in emergency loans to foreign economies in crisis. Why would US policymakers ever put national financial resources at risk to bail out foreign governments and citizens to whom they are not beholden when the IMF was created for this purpose? I argue the United States has been compelled to provide such rescues unilaterally when it believes a multilateral response via the IMF is either too slow or too small to protect vital US economic and financial interests. Through a combination of historical case studies and statistical analysis, I uncover the defensive motives behind US decisions to provide global liquidity from the 1960s through the 2008 global financial crisis. The book paints a more complete picture of how international financial crises have been managed and highlights the unique role that the United States has played in stabilizing the world economy in troubled times.
Justice and Legitimacy in Upbringing
Clausewitz's Puzzle
International Legitimacy and World Society
Levelling the Playing Field
Multicultural Nationalism
The Politics of Public Service Bargains
Corporate Governance, Competition, and Political Parties
The European Union and the People
Citizenship and the Environment
