Making a Modern Central Bank
The Bank of England 1979–2003

An authoritative guide to the transformation of the Bank of England into a modern inflation-targeting independent central bank.

Harold James (Author)

9781108835015, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 17 September 2020

350 pages
23.5 x 16 x 3.8 cm, 0.95 kg

'James has written a fascinating history of the Bank of England during a tumultuous period of policy-making … benefits from access to internal memos and reports, as well as interviews with many of the key players … ranges over the BOE's involvement in financial supervision as well as its role in promoting the City of London.' Harold James, America Social Sciences

Making a Modern Central Bank examines a revolution in monetary and economic policy. This authoritative guide explores how the Bank of England shifted its traditional mechanisms to accommodate a newly internationalized financial and economic system. The Bank's transformation into a modern inflation-targeting independent central bank allowed it to focus on a precisely defined task of monetary management, ensuring price stability. The reframing of the task of central banks, however, left them increasingly vulnerable to financial crisis. James vividly outlines and discusses significant historical developments in UK monetary policy, and his knowledge of modern European history adds rich context to archival research on the Bank of England's internal documents. A worthy continuation of the previous official histories of the Bank of England, this book also reckons with contemporary issues, shedding light on the origins of growing backlash against globalization and the European Union.

1. Introductory
2. Foreign Fetters
3. The Performance of the UK Economy
4. The Inexplicable in Pursuit of the Uncontrollable: Monetary Strategy
5. “A Good Deal of Bad Advice”: The Battle over Policy Control
6. The Long Shadow of the Deutschemark: The Exchange Rate Alternative
7. Hong Kong: Bank Crises and Currency Crises
8. Shaved Eyebrows: Banking and Financial Supervision
9. Tunneling Deep: The Bank and the Management of British Industry
10. Great Leap in the Dark: The Bank, the Delors Committee and the Euro
11. The Spine Theory and its Collapse: The ERM and the 1990s Recession
12. “You can't be in and out at the same time:” The Legacy of Delors
13. Horses for Courses: The Drive for Independence
14. Failure of Internal Communication: The Development of Banking Supervision in the 1990s
15. The New Bank: A University of Threadneedle Street?
16. Epilogue
Appendix 1. Biographies
Appendix 2. The History of Monetary Aggregates

Subject Areas: Banking [KFFK], Economic history [KCZ], Macroeconomics [KCB], Economics [KC]