The introduction of the euro was an important event for the world economy and the international political system. For the first time in history, a substantial group of European countries-eleven of the fifteen members of the European Union including three members of the G-7-have voluntarily agreed to replace their national currencies with a single currency. The euro area has already become established as the second largest currency area in the world and will therefore become a major player in the international monetary system. The creation of the euro poses a number of interesting questions. Will the euro be a strong or a weak currency? Will the euro challenge the leading position hitherto held by the United States dollar and would sharing of the burdens and advantages of reserve currency status improve or worsen the stability of the international monetary system? How will the euro affect US relations with Europe? Does the formation of the euro intensify European integration in other fields? Is a bi-polar international monetary system viable? These and other issues motivated the Luxembourg Institute for European and International Studies and the Pierre Werner Foundation to organize an international conference in Luxembourg on December 3-4, 1998, on the eve of the birth of the euro. At the outset we were aware that the issue of the euro went far beyond pure economics. Money, after all, is too important a subject to be left to economists.

The impact of a unified European currency on the international monetary system and Britain's entry into the European Community.

Why is sterling under pressure? Why was the devaluation in 1967 followed by stagnation of British economy? What do the 1971 monetary reforms mean for sterling in the 1970s? First published in 1973, The Functions of Sterling discusses these vital questions and challenges the received wisdom of those who tells us it is beneficial that our money should be worth less. It also examines critically the internal and external performance of sterling throughout the twentieth century. The book argues that the credit control policy offers a real possibility of improved economic growth and encourage the revaluation of sterling. To a large extent the book is in line with Sir Ralph Hawtrey’s reasoning and also integrates monetary economics with "real" problems of comparative costs, innovations, and growth. This book is an essential read for scholars of British economy, public policy, political economy, and economics in general.

Banking on Sterling: Britain's Independence from the Euro Zone, by Ophelia Eglene, provides an in-depth analysis of the British policy on the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) over the past twenty years. Eglene demonstrates how the Conservative government of John Major and the Labour government of Tony Blair implemented policies that had the same overriding goals. The first of their shared goals was to continue being involved in decisions on the remaining details of the EMU and to avoid discrimination in the European Union by appearing as a member state willing to embrace the full European project at an indeterminate point. The second goal was to address the conflicting preferences of domestic economic actors with an ambiguous policy aimed at buying time. Pressure on the British government came from both the business and financial sectors on the question of EMU membership. While the business community was divided on the euro, there was one sector, export-oriented producers, strongly in favor. The financial sector, for its part, needed more time to clearly assess where its interests lay, and it insisted that the government not rush a decision one way or the other. Banking on Sterling demonstrates that the government--no matter which party was in power--always had in mind the welfare of the financial sector. When the conclusion was reached in London that its financial sector would benefit more from an offshore position than as a member of the EMU, the British government provided both direct and indirect compensation to the export-oriented business sector that had definitely lost the battle for the euro. Ophelia Eglene's Banking on Sterling: Britain's Independence from the Euro Zone effectively shows the unequal influence of business and finance on the British economy.

Europe’s financial crisis cannot be blamed on the Euro, Harold James contends in this probing exploration of the whys, whens, whos, and what-ifs of European monetary union. The current crisis goes deeper, to a series of problems that were debated but not resolved at the time of the Euro’s invention. Since the 1960s, Europeans had been looking for a way to address two conundrums simultaneously: the dollar’s privileged position in the international monetary system, and Germany’s persistent current account surpluses in Europe. The Euro was created under a politically independent central bank to meet the primary goal of price stability. But while the monetary side of union was clearly conceived, other prerequisites of stability were beyond the reach of technocratic central bankers. Issues such as fiscal rules and Europe-wide banking supervision and regulation were thoroughly discussed during planning in the late 1980s and 1990s, but remained in the hands of member states. That omission proved to be a cause of crisis decades later. Here is an account that helps readers understand the European monetary crisis in depth, by tracing behind-the-scenes negotiations using an array of sources unavailable until now, notably from the European Community’s Committee of Central Bank Governors and the Delors Committee of 1988–89, which set out the plan for how Europe could reach its goal of monetary union. As this foundational study makes clear, it was the constant friction between politicians and technocrats that shaped the Euro. And, Euro or no Euro, this clash will continue into the future.