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,...

This highly topical book examines the development and future prospects for economic and monetary union in Europe. European Monetary Integration examines the background to economic and monetary union from a historical perspective that distinguishes between national and supranational currency...

Economic and Monetary Union in Europe brings together contributions from leading specialists which explain and evaluate the most important implications of economic and monetary union. The book examines theoretical aspects of monetary integration, illustrates the historical lessons to be learned...

Potential new entrants to the European Union from Central and Eastern European countries face many challenges to achieve financial convergence with the existing EU nations. Using detailed case studies from Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland and analysis of cross country...

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...