Analyzes the roots of Europe's economic decline, examining institutions of the European Union and exploring possibilities for reform.

The European Community is negotiating a new treaty to establish the constitutional foundations of an economic and monetary union in the course of the 1990s. This study provides the only comprehensive guide to the economic implications of economic and monetary union. The work of an economist inside the Commission of the European Community, it reflects the considerations influencing the design of the union. The study creates a unique bridge between the insights of modern economic analysis and the work of the policy makers preparing for economic and monetary union.

The book has many merits, and represents an important contribution to the controversial topic of European fiscal policy. I appreciated in particular the high quality and rigor of the analysis and the fact that the pros and cons of the contending opinions are presented in a fair way. It is a rewarding reading. EAEPE Newsletter Buti and Franco present a series of interesting analytical information which should be read by as broad an audience as possible. . . the book is a good buy. László Csaba, Acta Oeconomica This book explores the origins, rationale, problems and prospects of the European fiscal policy framework. It provides the reader with a roadmap to EMU s budgetary framework by exploring its theoretical and empirical foundations, uncovering its historical roots and emphasising its supranational nature. The authors, who have been at the forefront of the academic and policy debate on economic policy in Europe, argue that fiscal policy has always been at the core of the EMU debate. The Maastricht criteria and the Stability and Growth Pact are the most contentious building blocks of EMU s institutional architecture: they have aroused heated controversies between academics and policymakers ever since their adoption. As EMU s budgetary rules undergo their first severe shock, Europe is still searching for its fiscal soul. The book s basic premise is that one cannot fully understand EMU s fiscal framework and the recent debate on its reform without placing them in a historical and institutional perspective and abstracting from the uniqueness of EMU, where sovereign countries retain a large degree of fiscal independence, and monetary policy is entrusted to an independent central bank with the overriding mission of maintaining price stability. Analysing all aspects of EMU s fiscal rules and institutions, this book will strongly appeal to students, academics and researchers of macroeconomic policy and European integration. Policymakers and fiscal policy experts at both national and international levels will also find the book to be of great interest.

This book focuses on the construction of the economic policies of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and its institutions. It reviews the faltering economic performance of the EMU countries before and after the onset of the financial crisis.

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.

In this book, a historical analysis of the precedents of the euro is examined within the context of the current issues affecting the Eurozone and the long-term effects of the institutional changes implemented since 2010. The book begins by placing the Eurozone challenges in the historical context of previous monetary unions, drawing on the experience of the gold standard. It then specifically focuses on the problems arising from the running of permanent trade imbalances within the Eurozone. The authors explore the advantages and disadvantages of being a member of the Eurozone and attempt to measure the optimality of a currency area by the calculation of an index on internal macroeconomic asymmetries. They address the proposals recently made in favour of a fiscal union in the Euro zone; including the economic and political feasibility of fiscal transfers in the Eurozone. The final two papers discuss whether the monetary union is in fact more than just that, and whether it will lead inevitably to some form of political union if it is to survive. With chapters by leading experts from both Europe and the UK, this book will appeal to students in Economics, Finance, Politics, EU integration and European studies; as well as academics and professional economists doing research in EU integration, the Euro zone, monetary history and monetary and banking unions in Europe, the UK and elsewhere.