This important new book provides a non-technical, comprehensive overview of the central issues surrounding the euro. Following an introduction to the origins of European integration, the authors proceed to examine the first concrete steps in the process that led to the creation of the euro area....

The handbook on the history of European banks combines a comprehensive overview with extensive and detailed empirical analysis on the development of European banking and the subsequent impact of banks on national economies

This book deals with the economic consequences of monetary integration, which has long been dominated by the Optimal Currency Area (OCA) paradigm. In this model, money is perceived as having developed from a private sector cost minimization process to facilitate transactions. Not surprisingly,...

The authors offer a sustained argument that the single currency as currently implemented does not promise to deliver prolonged growth. They contend that the economic impact of the euro, and its accompanying institutions, is likely to be destabilising and deflationary; that the political impact...

The dramatic evolution of financial markets in the 1980s and 1990s, accompanied by increasing institutional integration between nations (most notably in the EU), have fostered a widespread belief that governments - particularly those of small economies - have essentially lost the power to pursue...