Abstract
When the EMS was launched in 1978, the new plan for exchange rate stability in Europe was accepted with much scepticism. Policy-makers were still influenced by the collapse of Bretton Woods, and concentrated on learning how to live with flexible exchange rates. Because economists were also attempting to understand the working of flexible exchange rates, there was no analysis of the EMS until the mid-1980s. Now the situation is quite different. The conventional wisdom is that the EMS has been a success, and the debate in Europe has moved on to the issue of monetary unification and the European central bank. Outside Europe, the reform of the international monetary system is no longer an unfashionable topic: ‘target zones’, and the simple return to fixed exchange rates, have taken centre stage in policy discussions and, to some extent, in economic analysis.1
I am especially indebted to Alberto Giovannini, for I draw freely in this chapter on material contained in our book (1989a).
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© 1990 Piero Ferri
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Giavazzi, F. (1990). The EMS: Lessons from Europe and Perspectives in Europe. In: Ferri, P. (eds) Prospects for the European Monetary System. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-11629-4_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-11629-4_3
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