A Concise History of International Finance
From Babylon to Bernanke

A comprehensive survey of international financial history across three thousand years that reveals how previous crises were successfully overcome.

Larry Neal (Author)

9781107621213, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 22 October 2015

376 pages, 48 b/w illus. 5 tables
22.7 x 15.2 x 1.8 cm, 0.59 kg

'As economists and policy makers are drawn to history for a deeper understanding of the wonders and dangers of financial innovation, Neal's outstanding scholarship provides the much-needed introduction to financial development from the Assyrian times to the present. It will remain the standard reference for years to come.' Gianni Toniolo, co-author of The World Economy Between the Wars

Ever since the financial crisis of 2008, doubts have been raised about the future of capitalism. In this broad-ranging survey of financial capitalism from antiquity to the present, Larry Neal reveals the ways in which the financial innovations throughout history have increased trade and prosperity as well as improving standards of living. These innovations have, however, all too often led to financial crises as a result of the failure of effective coordination among banks, capital markets and governments. The book examines this key interrelationship between financial innovation, government regulation and financial crises across three thousand years, showing through past successes and failures the key factors that underpin any successful recovery and sustain economic growth. The result is both an essential introduction to financial capitalism and also a series of workable solutions that will help both to preserve the gains we have already achieved and to mitigate the dangers of future crises.

1. Introduction
2. Distant beginnings: the first 3,000 years
3. The Italians invent modern finance
4. The rise of international financial capitalism: the seventeenth century
5. The 'big bang' of financial capitalism: financing and refinancing the Mississippi and South Sea Companies, 1688–1720
6. The rise and spread of financial capitalism, 1720–89
7. Financial innovations during the 'birth of the modern', 1789–1830: a tale of three revolutions
8. British recovery and attempts to imitate in the US, France and Germany, 1825–50
9. Financial globalization takes off: the spread of sterling and the rise of the gold standard, 1848–79
10. The first global financial market and the classical gold standard, 1880–1914
11. The Thirty Years War and the disruption of international finance, 1914–44
12. The Bretton Woods era and the re-emergence of global finance, 1945–73
13. From turmoil to the 'Great Moderation', 1973–2007
14. The sub-prime crisis and the aftermath, 2007–14
References
Index.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ]