A pioneer treatment of monetary economics written by two of world's leading authorities.

Modern mainstream economics is attracting an increasing number of critics of its high degree of abstraction and lack of relevance to economic reality. Economists are calling for a better reflection of the reality of imperfect information, the role of banks and credit markets, the mechanisms of economic growth, the role of institutions and the possibility that markets may not clear. While it is one thing to find flaws in current mainstream economics, it is another to offer an alternative paradigm which, can explain as much as the old, but can also account for the many 'anomalies'. That is what this book attempts. Since one of the biggest empirical challenges to the 'old' paradigm has been raised by the second largest economy in the world - Japan - this book puts the proposed 'new paradigm' to the severe test of the Japanese macroeconomic reality.

This timely book uses cutting-edge research to analyse the fundamental causes of economic and financial crises, and illustrates the macroeconomic foundations required for future economic policymaking in order to avoid these crises. The expert contributors take a critical approach to monetary analysis, providing elements for a new paradigm of economic policymaking at both national and international levels. Major issues are explored, including: inflation, capital accumulation and involuntary unemployment, sovereign debts and interest payment, and the euro-area crisis. Opening new lines of research in the economic and financial crises, this book will prove a fascinating read for academics, students and researchers in the field of monetary economics. Monetary policymakers, central bank officials and international financial organisations will also find the book to be an invaluable resource.

A historic analysis of the evolution of money and credit reveals how the nature of money changed: private property plus interest, tally sticks, coinage, fractional reserve banking, gold standards, fiat currencies, debasement of fiat against gold. The results of the historic analysis are combined with the new theories of money, credit, and finance of Bethmann, Heinsohn, Kindleberger, Kutyn, Malik, Martin, Minsky, Nuri, Rothbard, Soddy, Soros, and Steiger. Their integration forms a stringent economic theory that is able to explain the past and present economic and financial system from a very new perspective executing a paradigm shift in economics, finance, and monetary theory.

This book sheds light on some of the most recent developments in monetary analysis which offer a theoretical framework for a renewed monetary approach and related policy extensions. It points to recent research on what a consistent and broad-scope monetary theory could be based in the twenty-first century. It highlights new interpretations of monetary theory as put forth by some leading economists since the eighteenth century and new developments in the analysis of current monetary issues.

Everybody uses money every day, but we rarely stop to think about how money works. In this book, scholars from different disciplines seek to answer that question; from historians to economists, sociologists, a philosopher and a physicist. Money works as a social construction because we have mutual expectations that support its use – despite the seeming irrationality of trading valuable things or doing strenuous work for pieces of paper or numbers in accounts. Recently, there has been a revival of interest in monetary theory, not least because the impacts of globalizing markets and of new communication and information technologies have changed the forms of money. The deep crisis of the financial system has demonstrated the importance of a functioning monetary system and although renewed interest in this has led to significant contributions in various fields, it remains true that no social science discipline on its own is sufficiently equipped to explain the basic workings of monetary systems, their rapid innovation and their effects on social, economic and political structures. The contributors to this book report on their latest research on the origins of money, on the nature of monetary transactions, on money and the state, and on the role of money and finance in the recent global crisis. They show how established theories of money and the policies guided by these theories went wrong. This collection will be a valuable resource for students and researchers seeking a deeper understanding of money.