Global Financial Instability and the Evolution of Global Banking Regulation

Abstract

In this chapter, I outline the evolution of the global politics around the Basel Committee since the collapse of the Bretton Woods agreement in the early 1970s, with a focus on the period 1998–2014. Next, however, I briefly introduce the essentials of financial stability as a public good, whilst highlighting its increasingly global character, and banks as businesses subject to regulation. In Section 2.2, I explain how a transnational regulatory regime has evolved (and continues to evolve) around the Basel Committee. I argue that we are witnessing incremental transnationalisation of the policy process, deepening global politicisation, and growing transnational institutionalisation in the governance structure. Finally, I discuss which actors wield influence through which institutional channels in this constellation.