The paper explores the interaction between debt crises and devaluation. Since the optimal level of devaluation in a crisis depends on the level of debt that has to be serviced, a default makes a devaluation less likely. Expected devaluation depends thus on expectations about default which is...

The politically and legally complicated character of the EU Eastern Enlargement heavily influenced the conflict between the legal and economic rationality underlying the construction of the EMR-II. This makes the ERM-II vulnerable to currency crises and creates conditions for a widespread...

Recent debates about the state of Japan's financial system focus on the weakness of Japanese banks. But, in the complex financial relations of an advanced economy bank finance cannot be seen separate from other forms of financial intermediation. Despite the reform efforts under the Big Bang...

In recent years, institutional and evolutionary economists have become increasingly aware that ideas play an important role in economic development. In the current literature, the problem is usually elaborated upon in purely theoretical terms. In the present paper it is argued that ideas are...

Most proposals for Asian monetary cooperation assign a special role to the Japanese yen as an anchor currency. We focus instead on the potential role of the Chinese renminbi. It becomes increasingly clear that China will assume the role of the dominant economy in the region, and that it will...

A two sector small open economy model developed by Corden (1991, 2002) is used to analyse the impact of sudden stops in capital inflows on an internal and external equilibrium and to explore the merits of disposing of the nominal exchange rate as policy tool in rectifying real exchange rate...

The main focus of this paper is the question if the success of regional integration organisation in developing countries is, in fact, dependent on factors like similarity of their economic structure, market size or lack of committment. It is shown that there are also other more important...

The article is based on the idea that geographic proximity is an essential factor for international integration policies due to its impact on the intensity of bilateral foreign trade and growth rate. Development is analysed as a process of structural diversification, whereby the country in...