Economists in the public are accused of propagating highly professional, but unrealistic theories that mislead market agents and policy makers to place too much confidence in rational behaviour and market equilibrium. The paper analyses to what extent the US banking crisis and the euro crisis...

The emergence of the gold standard has for a long time been viewed as inevitable. Fluctuations of the gold-silver exchange rate in world markets were accused to lead to brutal and unsustainable switches of bimetallic countries' money supplies. However, more recent work has shown that the option...

We develop a simple model that highlights the costs and benefits of fixed exchange rates as they relate to trade, and show that negative export-price shocks reduce fiscal revenue and increase the likelihood of an expected currency devaluation. Using a new high-frequency data set on...

We use the demise of silver-based standards in the 19th century to explore price dynamics when a commodity-based money ceases to function as a global unit of account. We develop a general equilibrium model of the global economy with gold and silver money. Calibration of the model shows that...

There is nothing more fundamental to or characteristic of a constitutional system than the techniques it adopts and employs for the selection of its decision makers, be they executive, legislative, or judicial officials. Such techniques can be based on a variety of principles and can be codified...

In the post-war period prior to 1990 policy proposals aimed at reducing the instabilities associated with increased capital flows focused on increasing market efficiencies so that nominal variables would reflect real conditions in the economy. However, those in charge of financial resource flows...

The 2008 global financial crisis raised the expectations for the International Monetary Fund (IMF/the Fund) and instigated a call for a New Bretton Woods. In this paper, I review the Bretton Woods monetary system and the role of the IMF to suggest new insights into its role in the postwar...

This lecture discusses the work by the Estonian economist Ragnar Nurkse (1907-1959). It focuses on the early Nurkse, who was concerned with exchange rates, capital flows and what today we call the international financial architecture. It asks how many of the conclusions of International Currency...

The newly established South African Reserve Bank (SARB) was tasked to protect the currency by navigating the interwar gold standard, and, from March 1933, maintaining parity with the Pound Sterling. We find that South Africa's exit from gold secured an unparalleled and rapid recovery from the...